by Dean Hughes
The three men charged hard and then dropped into some long grass not far from the bridge. As the squad hit the bridge, they opened fire with their blanks. The men in the squad suddenly came to a stop, confused, and then ran forward again. As far as Alex was concerned, they were all erased. He jumped up and shouted, “Head for the bridge,” and off he ran.
“Watch those trees,” someone was screaming from across the bridge, and Alex guessed they were still wary of another attack from the south side of the creek. He charged across the bridge firing his M-1, with Huff next to him. Curtis had stopped by the bridge and was laying down covering fire—or at least a lot of noise—at the men who were in full view along the riverbank.
What followed was a good deal of confusion, but it all ended with Alex and Huff standing at the south side of the bridge and McCoy charging from the woods. “I’d say we have you,” Huff shouted. “This bridge is ours, straight legs.”
A huge argument followed, but it was a young lieutenant for the blues who finally said, “I guess you’re right. We did that all wrong.”
Alex and Huff looked at each other and began to laugh.
The exercise ended the following day. When the rest of Alex’s squad wandered into their base camp, they looked bedraggled and embarrassed. When Foley saw the four men who hadn’t been taken captive, he said, “Where have you guys been?”
Huff, of course, was the one who took the credit. “Hey, we took the bridge and held it. We covered your butt, Foley.”
“Don’t give me that? Where were you?”
“We did take the bridge,” Curtis said. “Alex planned out a surprise attack. We overran those blue guys.”
Huff protested that Alex’s plan had actually backfired, but he didn’t go so far as to admit that it was the incompetence of the blues that had worked most in favor of the four attackers. What soon circulated through the platoon, however, was the word that “Deacon” had been the guy who had gotten the job done.
And that’s probably why Lieutenant Summers came looking for Alex at the bivouac camp that night. “Thomas, I need to talk to you,” he said, and he turned and walked away from the other men.
Alex had been cleaning his rifle. He got up from where he was sitting, near his pup tent, and walked with the lieutenant away from the tents. When Summers stopped, he turned and looked at Alex. He crossed his long arms over his chest and said, “You did a good job out there. I think you’re becoming a soldier after all.”
“Sir, the truth is, we got pretty lucky,” Alex said.
“Listen, I need you. I need your leadership. I want to make you a corporal and assistant squad leader.”
Alex took a breath. He liked the idea of doing well, of being advanced, but he didn’t want to be drawn into leadership.
“I’d rather not, sir,” he said. “I don’t feel ready for a real battle.”
Summers moved his hands to his hips. “That’s just the trouble. No one is ready. But you have some sense. I need someone who can back up Foley—take over if he goes down. We’re going to be in this war before long—right in the middle of it. And we’re going to be thrown into impossible situations from the very beginning. I’m searching desperately for men who can step forward and lead.”
Alex had assumed an “at rest” position, but his body was tense. “Sir, the men wouldn’t want me as a leader. You know how they feel about me.”
“They may not be buddies with you, but they respect you.”
Alex knew what Summers meant. The men in the squad—especially Duncan—had watched as Sergeant Willard had kept the pressure on all during basic training. The sergeant’s expectations had been uniformly unreasonable, his punishments excessive. Alex had run twice as far as anyone, had pulled more KP, had listened to more corrections, more insults. But the results hadn’t been so bad. Alex felt the hardness in his body, and in his mind, and he knew that the other men stood in awe of what he had put up with.
Certainly their view of him had softened some, and at times Alex noticed hints of goodwill from some of them. But Duncan had tagged him with the nickname “Deacon,” and everyone had taken it up. They made fun of him for all he wouldn’t do—drink and party and fight—as well as for what he did: go to church when he could and study his scriptures in the barracks. Worst for Alex, however, was the estrangement, the loneliness. If it hadn’t been for Curtis, Alex doubted he could have survived.
“I’d rather be a rifleman, sir. I don’t want to—”
Lieutenant Summers suddenly swore. “Thomas, you still don’t know which side you’re on, do you?”
“Yes, sir. I do know that,” Alex said.
The lieutenant stepped a little closer. “Tell me why you don’t want to lead, then.”
“Lieutenant Summers,” Alex said, “when I signed up for airborne, the recruiter told me there was a need for guys who could speak German. He said I would probably end up in an intelligence unit.”
Summers let that sink in for a moment before he said, “You’re telling me you wanted to back up the troops, put them in the right places so they could do the killing, but you don’t want to kill anyone yourself.”
“Sir, I didn’t say that.”
“Well, then, what are you saying?”
But Alex was face to face with his own logic, and he knew that Summers was right. He didn’t know what to say.
“You joined up,” the Lieutenant said. “You told yourself—and everyone back home—that you were ready to do your part. But you haven’t made the commitment. You still don’t want to get your hands bloody.”
“I’ll do what I have to do.”
But that wasn’t good enough for Summers. He cursed Alex. “You don’t get it, soldier,” he shouted into his face. “We have to win this war—and you don’t have any idea what it’s going to take to do that.”
Alex felt the truth of that—the fear.
That night he lay in his tent, deathly tired but unable to sleep, and he was quite sure he had made a mistake to come this far. He should have stayed home and built parts—little gadgets that didn’t look dangerous but played their own remote role in the killing. He had found that work difficult, but it was nothing compared to what he would face in battle. He kept hearing Summers’ accusation: you don’t want to get your hands bloody. That was exactly right, but Alex couldn’t help it. He knew the enemy, and that knowledge was something the other men didn’t have to carry into battle, like an extra field pack—immense and loaded.
Chapter 15
Gene was sitting on an almost-empty trolley. As it bumped and rattled over the tracks, he stared ahead, lost inside himself. He wondered what he could expect. It was the day after his high school graduation, and he had just left the marine recruiting office, where he had enlisted. Almost all the guys in his graduating class, including Gene, talked about their eagerness to get into the war, but now, alone, and knowing that he really was going, he felt nervous.
As a marine, he was almost sure to go to the Pacific, and he wondered what kinds of exotic places he might see. He tried to think of the adventure of it all, but a picture kept returning to his mind. At a movie one night, he had watched a “March of Time” newsreel and had seen a squad of marines dug in on an island. They were sitting in foxholes, eating from mess kits. Now, as the image returned, the whole idea—leaving home, living in barracks or in foxholes—made his stomach uneasy.
Gene had always liked his comfort. He had liked camping out with the Boy Scouts—for a few days—but after, he had been happy to get back to his own bed and his mother’s cooking. He didn’t sleep well in a sleeping bag, and he liked to take a nice warm bath before he went to bed at night. It was hard to imagine himself in a bunk on a rocking ship, or rolled up like a potato bug in the dirt. Once, on a hike, he had gotten into some poison ivy, and he had been miserable for days. He was pretty sure that jungles had all sorts of insects and snakes and poisonous plants; he worried about the misery of life in a place like that.
He and Ralph had talked for
a long time about joining up together. But Ralph’s bum knee was keeping him out. He had tried every branch of the service, and no one wanted someone with a leg that was unlikely to hold up. Gene knew he would feel a lot better if the two of them were going off together, and the truth was, he sometimes felt a twinge of envy that Ralph could avoid the service without any dishonor. He believed in the war, was committed to doing his share, and when he listened to news reports and heard about the atrocities of the Germans and Japanese—or when he thought of Wally—he sometimes became impatient to get into the action.
But today he was feeling apprehensive. He didn’t think about death or wounds or even battle. He sensed only that he was giving away more than he had realized, more than he wanted to give. He had turned himself, like a parcel of goods, over to the government, it seemed, and he sensed that he wouldn’t get the package back in its original condition.
When Gene got off the trolley on Twenty-first South, he didn’t walk home. He walked to Millie’s house instead. He knocked on the door, and then, when Millie appeared, he said, “Come outside for a minute. I want to tell you something.”
“You signed up, didn’t you?” she said. She pushed the screen door open and stepped outside. “I look so awful. I’m embarrassed for you to see me.”
She was wearing jeans and saddle shoes and a man’s white shirt that was much too big for her. Gene tucked his hands into his pants pockets. He had worn his Sunday suit to the recruiter’s office, although he didn’t know why. Maybe it had made him feel older. “Actually, you look good,” he said. He saw her blush, instantly, and he knew it was because he so rarely said anything of that kind.
“So what did you decide?” she asked. “Navy or marines?”
“Marines.”
“Oh, Gene, why?”
The two of them had talked about this a lot lately. Millie was pretty sure the navy would be safer, and she couldn’t understand why Gene would even consider the marines. “I don’t know,” Gene said. Then he laughed. “Wally’s in the Army Air Force, Alex in the paratroopers, and Bobbi in the navy. I just figured there ought to be a Thomas in the marines. How else are we going to win the war?”
But Millie looked worried. “Don’t marines get the most dangerous duty?”
“I don’t know. They’re supposed to be the best; that’s what I like.”
“That’s not why you’re going into the marines. I know the real reason.”
“What’s that?”
“Because you know you’ll be in the Pacific. And you have it in your head that you’ll be fighting to get Wally free.”
Gene looked past Millie. “Well . . . yeah. I would like to fight in the Philippines—and help liberate those prison camps. I don’t know if I’ll ever get that chance, though.”
“You miss him all the time, don’t you?”
“Sure I do.”
Millie looked into his eyes as though she were trying to understand something inside him, but Gene tried not to let her in, although he couldn’t have said why.
“Why don’t you take your coat and tie off?” she finally said. “You look hot.”
It was a pretty June morning. A light rain had fallen the past couple of days, and the storm had cleared the air. But it was warming up today. Gene pulled his coat off, and he sat down on Millie’s front step. Out front were two big weeping willow trees that seemed to guard the house and cut it off from the street, the world. Gene had sat on these steps so many times, but this morning he was feeling that his former life was over, and everything familiar to him would soon be taken away.
“When do you leave?”
“Three weeks from yesterday.”
“Are you worried?”
Gene looked away. “Naw.”
“Come on, Gene. You have to be a little nervous, at least.”
“Well, yeah. A little. I’ve heard that boot camp is awfully hard.”
“You’ll do fine there. It’s the war I’m worried about.” She waited for him to look at her again, and when he did, he was struck with how pretty she was. Gene preferred the way she looked when she was serious, when her dimples were subtle and her eyes soft. She reached over and took hold of his hand. “I hope you end up in an office somewhere typing letters for a general.”
A robin fluttered down onto the lawn. Its head jerked back and forth, and then it took a couple of tentative steps before it looked this way and that again. Gene was amazed at the way he was noticing things this morning. He had watched robins all his life, without a second thought, but now he wondered whether there would be robins where he was going, whether there would be anything familiar to him. He glanced at Millie again.
“Gene, I’m going to be here,” Millie said. “I’m going to wait for you—no matter how long you’re gone. I want you to know that and never doubt it.”
But Gene didn’t want this. He had thought a lot about it, and he didn’t think promises were a good idea. “Millie, let’s just . . . see what happens. We’re friends, and—”
“Gene, I love you. I’ve been in love with you since I was a little girl, and I’m going to love you through all eternity. There isn’t even another possibility.”
She was grasping his hand, but he didn’t look at her. He didn’t want this to happen.
“I don’t expect you to say the same thing to me, Gene. I know how you are. But I just want you to know that I’m going to be here when you get back.”
Gene continued to look toward the lawn, saw the robin bob its head and peck at the grass. “Let’s just be friends,” he said. “Let’s write to each other—and you can tell me what’s happening around here. Stuff like that.”
“Gene, I know you don’t feel as strong about me as I do about you. And I don’t want you to feel trapped. But I can’t help it. I feel the way I do, and I’m not going to change.”
He knew what she wanted him to say, but he just couldn’t. He was sorry he had stopped by. “When do you start work?” he asked.
“Monday. I’m helping Mom with some cleaning today.”
“Do you want to do something Friday night?”
“Yes. And Saturday too.” She smiled, and her dimples deepened. “And I want to see you at church on Sunday, and have you come over Sunday evening. And I want to see you every other minute that I can have you until you leave. I know I’m being too forward to say all that, but it’s true.”
“Well, I . . . want to spend time with you, too.”
“Wow. For Gene Thomas, that’s almost a profession of love. I’m going to write those words in my diary tonight—just so I can check back and be sure I’ve remembered right.”
Gene got up. “I’ll see you Friday,” he said.
“What about tonight?”
“I don’t know. I could come over, if you want.”
“I want.”
She grasped his hand tightly again, and she stood close to him. He knew she was hoping for a little kiss—since he had kissed her good night a few times lately—but he wasn’t about to do anything like that, not outside in broad daylight where someone might be watching.
***
LaRue and Beverly cooked dinner that night. Mom had told them that would be their assignment for the summer. She and Dad had a hard time getting away from the plant, and one or the other often returned in the evening to make sure the second shift was doing all right. President Thomas sometimes had church duties in the evening, and with so many women employees, Sister Thomas was especially effective at teaching the use of the machinery. She had a great knack for helping new hires relax and gain confidence. Mom also felt it was good for LaRue to take over more of the household chores and learn from the experience.
LaRue actually liked that idea—especially the pay she and Beverly would get for it—but she was always bigger on ideas than she was at carrying things out. Gene was impressed by the dinner the girls had prepared, but he wondered how long they would keep putting out that kind of effort. Beverly was easily distracted, and Gene could almost guess that the two
girls would soon be upset with each other, with LaRue assuming herself to be the boss. Still, the table was set very nicely, and except for the lumpy mashed potatoes and a rather odd taste to the gravy, everything was fine. He even said so.
“Holy cow, Gene,” LaRue said, “you’re not leaving for three weeks. You don’t have to start being nice quite yet.”
“He’ll be happy if he can get a meal like this in a few weeks,” Dad said.
Gene had heard far too much about the lousy food in the military. It was one of his great dreads. “The recruiter said we’ll eat better in the marines than in the army.”
“I don’t get it,” LaRue said. “All we hear about is food shortages at home—so we can feed the boys in the service. If we have to go without everything, how come soldiers don’t eat any better?”
“They turn it all into K rations,” Dad said, and he laughed. “It’s hard to put good food in a can.”
Gene felt something strange in all this good humor. Everyone seemed to be trying a little too hard. But after a few moments, Mom said, more wistfully, “I’ll have to stop downtown and get another banner. There aren’t many four-star families in this valley.”
“That’s something to be proud of,” Dad said. “I could have claimed I needed Gene at the plant. I know the draft board would have let him stay.”
“Then why didn’t you do it?” Beverly asked. She usually said so little that it was surprising she would ask the question so forcefully.
“I would have. But Gene and I talked about it, and that’s not what he wanted. He wants to do his part, the same as the rest of the family.”
“Me and LaRue aren’t doing anything.”
“Oh, yes you are,” Mom said. “Collecting scrap metal. Storing up cooking fat. Saving string and tin foil. Even doing this cooking for us this summer. That sets your dad and me free to do what we have to do.”
“I wish I could go shoot some Japs,” LaRue said. “That’s what I’d like to do.”
