Once There Was a War

by John Steinbeck

  “I’m worried about this hand,” he says. “Of course, I guess I can get a job. I’m not worried about that so much. I can always get a job. But I’ve got to get this hand into shape so that it will grab ahold of things.” He turns the model plane over and then studies the pattern sheet for the next piece. He is silent for a long time. “My wife knows I was hurt. She doesn’t know how bad. She knows I’m going to get well all right and come home, but—she must be thinking pretty hard. I got to get that hand working. She wouldn’t like a cripple with a hand that wouldn’t work.”

  His eyes are a little feverish. “Well, how would you like a cripple to come home? What would you think about that?

  “It will always be a little crooked,” he says, “but I wouldn’t mind that so much if it worked. I don’t think she would mind so much if it worked. She has got a job in a plane factory out on the Coast—doing a man’s work. She says she is doing fine and I’m not to worry. Here. I’ll show you a picture of her.” He reaches in his bathrobe pocket. “Where is it?” he says. “The nurse always puts it in here.” He puts his left hand in his pocket and brings out a little leather wallet. And suddenly he sees what he has done and the fingers relax and the wallet drops to the table. “God Almighty!” he says. “Did you see that?” He looks at the crooked hand still suspended in the air. “That’s twice in two days,” he says softly. “Twice in two days.”

  The Career of Big Train Mulligan

  SOMEWHERE IN ENGLAND, August 4, 1943—It has been possible to compile further data on the life and methods of Private Big Train Mulligan, a man who has succeeded in making a good part of the Army work for him. It has been said of him by one of his enemies, of whom he has very few, that he would be a goldbrick but he is too damn lazy.

  In a course of close study, extending over several days, certain qualities have stood out in the private in addition to those mentioned in the previous report. Big Train has a very curious method. If you are not very careful, you find yourself carrying his luggage and you never know how it happened. Recently, in one of the minor crises which are an everyday occurrence to Big Train, this writer came out of a kind of a haze of friendship to find that he had not only lent Mulligan £2 10s, but had forced it on him without security and had, furthermore, emerged from the transaction with a sense of having been honored. How this was accomplished is anybody’s guess. Sometime in the future, no doubt, Mulligan will pay this money back, but in such a manner that it will seem that he has been robbed.

  Mulligan has carried looting, requisitioning, whatever you want to call it, to its highest point. He is a firm believer in the adage that an army moves on its stomach, a position he rather likes. He loves nice foods and he usually gets them. A few days ago a party was visiting a ship which had recently put into a port in England with war materials. The party went to the bridge, met the master and the other officers, drank a small cup of very good coffee, and ate a quarter-ounce of cookies, conversing politely the while. On coming back to the dock where the car stood and where Mulligan should conceivably be on duty, of course, no such thing was true.

  Mulligan was not in sight. One of this party who has known the private and admired him for some time remarked, “If I were to look for Mulligan right now I should find the icebox on that ship with a good deal of confidence that Mulligan would not be far from it.” Accordingly, the party found its way to the ship’s refrigerator and there was Mulligan, leaning jauntily back against a table. He was holding the thickest roast-beef sandwich imaginable in his hand. He has learned to eat very rapidly while talking on all subjects. He never misses a bite or a word. His pace seems slow but his execution is magnificent. Not between bites but during bites he was telling an admiring circle, made up of a steward and three naval gunners, a story of rapine and other amusements which completely distracted them from noticing that Big Train had a foot-high stack of sandwiches behind him on the table.

  The senior officer said, “Mulligan, don’t you think it is about time we went along?”

  Mulligan said, “Yes, sir. I was just coming along but I thought the captain might be a little hungry. I was just getting a snack ready for the captain.” He reached behind him and brought out the great pile of roast-beef sandwiches, which he passed about. Now, whether these sandwiches had been prepared for just such an emergency or whether Mulligan had intended to eat them himself will never be known. We prefer to believe that it was just as he said. Mulligan is a thoughtful friend and an unselfish man. Besides this, he never goes into a blind alley. He has always a line of retreat, which simply proves that he is a good soldier.

  Should his officer be faint with hunger, Mulligan has a piece of chocolate to tide the captain over. What difference that the chocolate belonged to the captain in the first place and he was led to believe that it was all gone? The fact of the matter is that when he needs his own chocolate Mulligan is happy to give him half of it.

  The Big Train has been in England now something over a year and he has acquired a speech which can only be described as Georgia-Oxford. He addresses people as “mate” or even “mait.” He refuses to learn that he cannot get petrol at a gas station but he refers to lifts and braces.

  Many an officer has tried to get Mulligan promoted to a corporalcy, if only to have something to break him from, but he is firmly entrenched in his privacy. There is nothing you can do to Mulligan except put him in jail and then you have no one to drive you. If he were a corporal you could break him, but Mulligan has so far circumvented any such move on the part of his superiors. When the recommendation has gone in, at just the right moment he has been guilty of some tiny infraction of the rules—not much, but just enough to make it impossible to promote him. His car is a little bit dirty at inspection. Mulligan does six hours’ full-pack drill and is safe from promotion for a good time.

  Mulligan has nearly everything he wants—women, leisure, travel, and companionship. He wants only one thing and he is trying to work out a way to get it. He would like a dog, preferably a Scottie, and he would like to take it in his car with him. So far he has not worked out his method, but it is a foregone conclusion that he will not only get his dog but that his officer will feed it, and when Mulligan has a date in the evening his officer will probably take care of the dog for him and will feel very good about it, too. The Army is a perfect setting for this Mulligan. He would be foolish ever to leave it. And he is rarely foolish.

  Chewing Gum

  LONDON, August 6, 1943—At the port the stevedores are old men. The average age is fifty-two, and these men handle the cargo from America. Their pace does not seem fast, but the cargo gets unloaded and away. The only men on the docks anywhere near military age who are not in uniform are the Irish from the neutral Free State, who are not subject to Army call. They stay pretty much to themselves; for while they may approve of their neutrality, it is not pleasant to be a neutral in a country at war. They feel outsiders.

  Little old Welshmen with hard, grooved faces handle the cargo. There is a shrunken man directing the big crane. He stands beside the open hatch and with his hands directs the cargo slings as though he were directing an orchestra. Palm down and the fingers fluttering brings down the sling. Palm up raises it, and by the tempo of his motions the operator knows whether to go slowly or rapidly. This man has a thin, high voice which nevertheless cuts through the noise of the pounding engine and grinding gears. His fingers flutter upward and the locomotive rises into the air on the end of a sling. The man seems to waft it over the side with his hands. Eighty-seven tons of locomotive, and he lowers it to the tracks on the docks with his hands.

  On an imaginary line the children stand and watch the cargo come out. They are not permitted to go beyond their line for fear they might be hurt. There are at least a hundred of them, a little shabby, as everyone in England is after four years of war. And not too clean, for they have been playing on ground that is largely coal dust. How they cluster about an American soldier who has come off the ship! They want gum. Much as the British may depl
ore the gum-chewing habit, their children find it delightful. There are semi-professional gum beggars among the children. “Penny, mister?” has given way to “Goom, mister?”

  When you have gum you have something permanent, something you can use day after day and even trade when you are tired of it. Candy is ephemeral. One moment you have candy, and the next moment you haven’t. But gum is really property.

  The grubby little hands are held up to the soldier and the chorus swells. “Goom, mister?”

  “I don’t have any,” the soldier says, but they pay no attention to that. “Goom, mister?” they shriek and crowd in closer. A steward comes down the gangplank from the ship. He is a little tipsy and he is dressed for the town. He is going to have a time for himself. A few children go to him and test him out. “Goom, mister?” they ask. The steward grins genially, pulls a handful of coins from his pocket and throws them into the air. The dust rises and covers a little riot, and when it clears the steward is in full flight with the pack baying after him.

  Only one small boy has stayed with the soldier—a very little boy with blond hair and gray eyes. He holds the soldier’s hand and the soldier blushes with pleasure. “Is it as nice in America as it is here?” the boy asks.

  “No—it’s just about the same as here,” the soldier says. “It’s bigger, but just about the same.”

  “I guess you really have no goom?”

  “No, not a piece.”

  “Is there much goom in America?”

  “Oh, yes, lots of it.”

  The little boy sighs deeply. “I’ll go there sometime,” he says gravely.

  The pack returns slowly. They have lost their quarry and are looking for new game. Then over the side the garbage is lowered in a large box. It is golden with squeezed orange skins. The children hesitate, because it is against all their training to break rules. But the test is too great. They can’t stand it. They break over the line and tumble on the garbage box. They squeeze the skins for the last drop of juice that may conceivably be there.

  A bobby comes up quickly, his high hat making him seem a foot taller than he is. “Get ahn naow, get ahn,” he says mildly.

  The rebels cram the skins into their pockets and then, dutifully, they go back to their boundary, but their pockets bulge with the loot.

  “That’s naught naice,” the bobby says. “But they do get very ’ungry for horanges. They really do. I ’aven’t ’ad a horange in four years. It’s the law; no one hover five years old can ’ave a horange.

  “They need them most, you see,” he explained.

  Mussolini

  LONDON, August 9, 1943—The ship was in mid-ocean when Mussolini resigned. Rumor ran among the soldiers and the crew and the Army nurses that something important had happened. Then, down from the bridge, came the corroboration— “Mussolini has resigned”—on that. For five days the people on board had that for their minds and their hopes to play with. And the process went something like this:

  Two sergeants and a PFC stood out of the wind in the lee of a life raft. “Well, you’ve got to admit it’s good news if it’s true,” the PFC said.

  “Yes,” said the technical sergeant, “but you know how it is when a guy is quitting. He gets kicked in the pants. There must be plenty of people who would like to take a sock at old Musso. I wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t live too long.”

  “You got right,” the staff sergeant said. “I’d hate to be in Musso’s shoes.”

  The ship plowed through the sea and the escorts hovered about like worried chickens. . . .

  A second lieutenant sat in the lounge, talking to an Army nurse. “Gin rummy?” he asked.

  “Sure,” said the nurse.

  The lieutenant leaned toward her. “A private in my outfit got it pretty straight. Somebody knocked off the Duce.”

  “How do you mean?”

  The second lieutenant shuffled and passed the deck for cut. “Got him. That’s what I mean. Cut his throat. I hope he bled some.”

  The nurse ignored the cards. She frowned. “I wonder whether he really had power or whether he was just a figurehead.”

  “Why? What difference does it make if he’s dead?”

  “Well,” said the nurse, “if he had power, then the Fascists go out with him gone. They’ll all get killed. They’ll all get killed. There’ll be a revolution. That’s what I mean.”

  “I guess you’re right,” said the lieutenant. “You want to keep score . . . ?”

  The captain lay on his back in his bunk in the crowded state-room. He talked to the bunk above him. “You’ve got to hand it to those Wops,” he said. “When they’ve got something to fight for, they sure put up a fight.”

  A major’s head appeared over the edge of the upper bunk. “What are you talking about?”

  “Didn’t you hear? After Mussolini got bumped off, the Wops revolted. They’ve got the nicest little revolution going you ever heard. Rome is a shambles. They’re hunting down the Fascists like rats.”

  “God Almighty,” said the major, “this would be the right time to invade. From a military point of view, you couldn’t ask for a better time. I wonder if we’ve got the stuff ready to do it?”

  A steward lingered in the passageway near the icebox. A KP came furtively near. “Stay out of those strawberries,” the steward said sternly.

  “We ain’t got no strawberries,” said the furtive one. “The nurses went through them strawberries like we’re going through Italy. I didn’t get none of them strawberries.”

  “Have we got into Italy?”

  “Got in? Where you been? We’re halfway up the calf right now. There’s MPs walkin’ the streets of Rome this minute and the Wops puttin’ flowers in their hair.”

  The captain interrupted the sleepy poker game. “We’ve got to have a drink on this,” he said. “Who’s got some whisky?”

  “Don’t be silly,” said a lieutenant colonel. “We haven’t had any whisky since the second day out. What are you drinking to? The invasion of Italy?”

  “Invasion, hell. Italy is in our hands.”

  “I’ve got a bottle,” said the lieutenant colonel, and he climbed over legs and dug in his briefcase. They stood together and clinked the glasses and tossed off the whisky. The captain turned and threw his glass out of the porthole. “That’s a pretty important drink,” he said. “I wouldn’t want any common drink to get into that glass.” He peered out the porthole. “A seagull picked us up. We can’t be very far out,” he said.

  The lieutenant colonel said, “You know, with Italy out, Germany is going to have a time holding the Balkans down. They’re going to want to get out from under. I bet Greece revolts, too. And Turkey was about ready to come in. This may be the push she needs.” . . .

  Three GIs sat in a windblown cave, made by slinging their shelter halves between a rail and a davit and a ventilator. They watched the whitecaps go surging by. “I’d like to get there before it’s over, Willie. I won’t get a chance to see any action if we don’t hurry up.”

  “You’ll see plenty action and you’ll tote plenty bales before you’re through, brother.”

  “I don’t know about that. With those Turks running wild, Germany can’t hold out forever. Why, Germany’s so busy now, I’ll bet we could even get in across the Channel. This is a slow damn scow.” . . .

  “Gentlemen,” said a twenty-year-old lieutenant to three other twenty-year-old lieutenants, “gentlemen, I give you Paris.”

  “My old man took Paris in the last war,” said one of the gentlemen.

  “Gentlemen,” said the first speaker, his voice shaking, “we’ve crossed the Channel. Oh, boy, oh, boy! We’re in.”

  The three joined hands in a kind of fraternal cat’s cradle. . . .

  And so the ship came into port with the war fought and won. It took them a little time to get over it.

  Craps

  LONDON, August 12, 1943—This is one of Mulligan’s lies and it concerns a personality named Eddie. Mulligan has soldiered with
Eddie and knows him well. Gradually it becomes apparent that Mulligan has soldiered with nearly everyone of importance.

  At any rate this Eddie was a crap shooter, but of such a saintly character that his integrity in the use of the dice was never questioned. Eddie was just lucky, so lucky that he could flop the dice against the wall and bounce them halfway across the barracks floor on a Sunday and still make a natural.

  From performances like this the suspicion grew that Eddie had the ear of some force a little more than human. Eddie, over a period of a year or two, became a rich and happy man, not so lucky in love, but you can’t have everything. It was Eddie’s contention that the dice could get him a woman any time, but he never saw a woman who could make him roll naturals. Sour grapes though this may have been, Eddie abode by it.

  Came the time finally when Eddie and his regiment were put on board a ship and started off for X. It wasn’t a very large ship, and it was very crowded. Decks and staterooms and alleys, all crowded. And it just happened that the ship sailed within reasonable time of payday.

  That first day there were at least two hundred crap games on the deck, and while Eddie got into one, he did it listlessly, just to keep his hand in, and not to tire himself, because he knew that the important stuff was coming later. Between the chicken games Eddie moped about and did a good deed or two to get himself into a state of grace he knew was necessary later. He helped to carry a “B” bag for a slightly tipsy GI and reluctantly accepted a pint of bourbon, which canceled out the good deed, to Eddie’s way of thinking. He wrote a letter to his wife, whom he hadn’t seen for twelve years, and would have posted it if he could ever have found a stamp.

  Occasionally he drifted back to the deck and got into a small game to keep his wrist limber and his head clear, but he didn’t have to. Eddie had a roll. He didn’t have to build up a bank in the preliminaries. He steered clear of spectacular play for two reasons. First, it was a waste of time. It was just as well to let the money get into a few hands before he exerted himself, and second, Eddie, at a time like this, preferred a kind of obscurity and anonymity. There was another reason too. The ship sailed on Tuesday and Eddie was waiting for Sunday, because he was particularly hot on Sundays, a fact he attributed to a clean and disinterested way of life. Once on a Sunday, and, understand, this is Mulligan’s story, Eddie had won a small steam roller from a road gang in New Mexico, and on another Sunday Eddie had cleaned out a whole camp meeting, and in humility had devoted 10 per cent of his winnings to charity.