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  “I said what the hell’s going on here?”

  “Nothing, sir,” said Shilansky weakly.

  “Nothing at all,” agreed Frankie La Barbara.

  Colonel Hutchins glowered down into the hole and wrinkled his nose. “Is that you down there, Sergeant Cameron?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What is this, a circle jerk!”

  The men disentangled themselves from each other and stood up. Sergeant Cameron smiled sheepishly. “Guess I musta slipped and fell, sir.”

  Colonel Hutchins snorted. It was an obvious lie and he knew it. The men had been fighting, and it looked like a court-martial offense had been taking place; but the Japs might attack again, and Colonel Hutchins had more important things to worry about.

  “Where’s Lieutenant Breckenridge?” Colonel Hutchins asked.

  Sergeant Cameron pointed. “Thataway.”

  “You men cut out the shit here, understand?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Carry on.”

  Colonel Hutchins walked away. Sergeant Cameron brushed himself off and picked up his rifle. “I shoulda told him the truth,” he said, glancing at Frankie La Barbara. “You belong behind bars, you son of a bitch.”

  “Fuck you where you breathe, you bastard,” Frankie replied.

  “You wouldn’t talk to me that way if I was Butsko,” Sergeant Cameron said.

  “Fuck Butsko and fuck his mother.”

  They were referring to Master Sergeant John Butsko, the platoon sergeant of the recon platoon, who was recovering from wounds at a hospital in Hawaii. Butsko had dominated the unruly recon platoon through sheer brutality and physical intimidation. His left leg had nearly been blown off during the last days of fighting on Bougainville, but his spirit and memory were still very much with the recon platoon.

  Sergeant Cameron slung his M 1 rifle over his shoulder. “It seems to me I came over here for some definite reason,” he said vaguely.

  “You fucking dim bulb,” Frankie replied. “Somebody ought to put you up against a wall and shoot you.”

  Sergeant Cameron stuck his finger straight up in the air. “I remember now. I need a detail to go to headquarters and pick up some ammo. You just volunteered for the detail, La Barbara.”

  “Fuck you in your ear,” Frankie replied. “I’m busy.”

  “Okay,” Sergeant Cameron said. “I’m not going to argue with you. I’m tired of arguing with you. I’m just gonna walk over there to Lieutenant Breckenridge’s command post and tell him you refused a direct order. I’ll let him take care of you personally.”

  “Fuck him too.”

  “I’ll tell him that for you. I’m sure he’ll want to know how you feel about him.” Sergeant Cameron grinned. “See you at the court-martial, wop, and I’m talking about your fucking court-martial, not mine.”

  Sergeant Cameron climbed out of the hole. He touched the bandage on his nose to make sure it still was there, and it was. Meanwhile, in the hole, Frankie La Barbara was thinking that he didn’t feel like hassling with Lieutenant Breckenridge that morning. Lieutenant Breckenridge was a big bruiser, as tough as Butsko and mean as a bull once he got going.

  “I’ll go,” Frankie said sullenly.

  Sergeant Cameron stopped and turned around. “Kinda thought you’d change your mind. Follow me.”

  Frankie slung his M 1 rifle over his shoulder. He put on his steel pot and climbed out of the hole. “Hold the fort,” he said to Shilansky.

  “Hurry back with the ammo.”

  “Fuck you in your eyeballs.”

  Frankie La Barbara followed Sergeant Cameron across the battlefield. He passed two soldiers from a graves registration squad carrying a stretcher on which was the bloody, broken body of Private Jilliam, only sixteen years old, who’d been killed during the big fight. Frankie spit at the ground and took out an Old Gold cigarette. He lit it and blew smoke out the corner of his mouth. He felt nervous and crazy, as if he’d drunk four cups of coffee in a row, except that he hadn’t drunk four cups of coffee in a row. His helmet was tilted on his head because he had a three-inch gash on his head and a big bloody bandage on top of it.

  Sergeant Cameron stopped at a foxhole and looked inside. Pfc. Jimmy O’Rourke sat inside beside Pfc. Billie Jones, the biggest man in the recon platoon, known as the Reverend because he’d been an itinerant preacher in Georgia before the war.

  “Jones,” said Sergeant Cameron.

  “Whataya want?” asked the Reverend Billie Jones, looking up from his handy pocket Bible.

  “You just volunteered to go to headquarters and get some ammunition.”

  “I did?”

  “Yeah, you did.”

  The Reverend Billie Jones groaned as he stood and stuffed his handy pocket Bible into his shirt pocket. He didn’t argue because he was used to being assigned to all the details that required heavy lifting. The good Lord didn’t make him big and strong for nothing. He was six feet two inches tall and weighed 285 pounds. He picked up his M 1 rifle and climbed out of the hole.

  Sergeant Cameron looked down at Pfc. Jimmy O’Rourke, who had been a movie stuntman in Hollywood before the war and who always wanted to be a big star like John Wayne, Gary Cooper, and, most of all, Clark Gable. He wore a black mustache like Clark Gable’s and had a tendency to tug his earlobes the way Clark Gable did.

  “How you doing?” Sergeant Cameron asked.

  Jimmy O’Rourke’s pant leg was rolled up and he had an ugly purple swelling on his right shin. “I think my fucking leg’s broken.”

  “Can you walk on it?”

  “More or less.”

  “Then it’s not broken. Go see the medic and get some APC pills.”

  “I already saw him and he gave me a bunch of them.”

  “You take ‘em?”

  “Yeah, but it didn’t do no fucking good. I think my leg’s broken.”

  “Your fucking head is broken, you bastard.”

  “Up your ass, Sarge.”

  “If I see the medic, I’ll send him over.”

  “Up his ass too.”

  Sergeant Cameron walked away, followed by Frankie La Barbara and the Reverend Billie Jones. Sergeant Cameron looked east, the direction in which the Japanese had fled at the first glimmer of dawn, and wondered when they’d come back. He hoped to have the fresh ammo in time.

  “Hurry up, you guys,” he said.

  “Fuck you,” replied Frankie La Barbara.

  The Reverend Billie Jones looked at Frankie. “Why do you always talk to him that way?”

  “Fuck you too.”

  “My God,” the Reverend Billie Jones replied, shaking his head in dismay.

  “Fuck Him too.”

  The Reverend Billie Jones rolled his eyes and groaned. They approached a spot where two shells had landed almost on top of each other. The resulting crater was deep and wide, and inside it sat Pfc. Hotshot Stevenson, the former pool shark from Chicago, and Private Victor Yabalonka, a former long-shoreman from San Francisco. Hotshot Stevenson was a wiry little man, full of fidgets and twitches, whereas Yabalonka, a relative newcomer to the recon platoon, was a big man, though not as big as the Reverend Billie Jones.

  “Yabalonka!” said Sergeant Cameron.

  Private Yabalonka looked up. “Whataya want?”

  “You just volunteered to go to Headquarters Company and bring back some ammo.”

  “I never volunteer for anything.”

  “You just did.”

  “No I didn’t. If you want me to do something, tell me to do it, but cut out the horseshit, will you?”

  “Have it your way,” Sergeant Cameron said. “Go to Headquarters Company with La Barbara and Jones, and bring back some ammo. Did I say it okay this time?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then get the fucking lead out.”

  Yabalonka covered his blond crew cut with his helmet and picked up his M 1 rifle. He climbed out of the hole and stood with Frankie and the Reverend Billie Jones.

  Now Sergeant Ca
meron was faced with a dilemma. He should place one man in charge of the detail, but as far as he was concerned, each one was worse than the other. Frankie La Barbara was basically a criminal and refused to do anything right. Not much was known about Yabalonka, since he was new to the recon platoon, but he was only a private and you couldn’t put a private in charge of two pfcs. Sergeant Cameron always figured Yabalonka was a bomb getting ready to explode, because Yabalonka wouldn’t have been assigned to the recon platoon if he hadn’t been in trouble someplace else before. The recon platoon got all the discipline problems, all the criminals, all the men inclined to punch first and ask questions later. Sergeant Cameron had been assigned to the recon platoon because he was an alcoholic, although he was all dried out now.

  Sergeant Cameron decided he’d have to appoint the Reverend Billie Jones, although the Reverend Billie Jones had demonstrated no leadership ability yet and was basically a religious fanatic who tended to go berserk on the battlefield.

  “Jones, you’re in charge,” Sergeant Cameron said.

  The Reverend Billie Jones was surprised. He touched his thumb to the middle of his chest and asked: “Me?”

  “What’d I just say? Didn’t I just say ‘Jones, you’re in charge’?”

  “That’s what you said.”

  “Then get the fuck going, and hurry back.”

  “Hup, Sarge.”

  The Reverend Billie Jones looked at the other two. “Let’s go.”

  He stepped out in the direction of Headquarters Company, and to his amazement Frankie La Barbara and Victor Yabalonka followed him. They walked away and Sergeant Cameron looked at them as he took out a Pall Mall cigarette and lit it with his old trusty Zippo, which he’d carried onto the beach at Guadalcanal and had kept with him ever since.

  I’m tired of dealing with these guys, he said to himself as he turned and walked back to his hole. They’re wearing me down. I’m no Butsko, and even Butsko had his hands full with the bastards. Maybe I should get myself busted down to private, and then some other poor son of a bitch’ll have to be platoon sergeant around here.

  He trudged across the battlefield, puffing his cigarette and touching his fingers to the bandage on his nose to make sure it still was there.

  Colonel Hutchins burped as he made his way across the battlefield toward the hole occupied by Lieutenant Breckenridge. The sun was rising in the sky and the heat intensified as if he were in an oven and somebody had turned up the knob all the way. He wore a bandage over his left eye, and another one could be seen on his chest through his open shirt. Like Sergeant Cameron, he was an alcoholic, but unlike Sergeant Cameron, he was not dried out. He had a few bottles of Old Forester back in his tent, and when they ran out he could rely on his trusty mess sergeant, who had operated an illegal still in Kentucky before the war. Colonel Hutchins also had a flask in his back pocket that was half empty, the other half being in his body, producing a mild euphoria.

  He came to the designated hole and saw Lieutenant Breckenridge sitting inside, looking at one of his maps. Craig Delane was nearby, taking a quick nap.

  “Morning,” said Colonel Hutchins.

  Lieutenant Breckenridge looked up and nearly shit a brick. He pushed his hands against the muck in an effort to stand and salute.

  “As you were,” said Colonel Hutchins, hopping into the hole.

  Craig Delane heard him land and woke up.

  ‘Take a walk,” Colonel Hutchins told him.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Craig Delane grabbed his rifle and jumped out of the hole, walking away as quickly as possible, anxious to stay out of trouble. He thought he’d track down the medic and find out if the cut on his cheek would mean that he’d be scarred for life.

  Meanwhile, inside the hole, Colonel Hutchins crouched down and lit a cigarette. “How’s your leg?”

  “I can walk on it.”

  “Can you go out on a patrol?”

  “I think so.”

  “Good. Take a few men and find out what’s in front of us out there. Use your walkie-talkie to stay in touch.”

  “When do you want me to go?”

  “As soon as you can.”

  “Don’t you think we should wait and see whether or not the Japs are gonna counterattack?”

  “If they haven’t counterattacked by now, I don’t think they will this morning. Maybe they will tonight, but for the time being I think we’re okay.”

  “Okay.”

  “Don’t forget to stay in touch.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Colonel Hutchins reached into his back pocket and took out his flask. He unscrewed the top, tossed his head back, and took a swig. Then he held out the flask to Lieutenant Breckenridge.

  “Want some?”

  “Don’t mind if I do.”

  Lieutenant Breckenridge accepted the flask and raised it to his lips. He eased his head back and let the mellow bourbon gurgle down his throat.

  Just then there was a terrific explosion fifty yards away. The earth shook and two sago palms were blown to shit as tons of dirt flew through the air.

  Lieutenant Breckenridge thought it was the bourbon. “Boy, this stuff has a helluva kick!” he said, passing the flask back to Colonel Hutchins.

  But Colonel Hutchins was already on his stomach inside the hole. “Hit it!” he screamed.

  A second explosion occurred one hundred yards away, demolishing a Jeep and the two GIs sitting inside it. Lieutenant Breckenridge dived toward the bottom of the hole, and when he landed, Colonel Hutchins snatched the flask out of his hand.

  “I’ll take care of that,” Colonel Hutchins said, screwing the top back on.

  Another Japanese artillery shell landed, and it was followed by another a few seconds later. Then the full weight of a Japanese barrage hit, artillery shells and mortar rounds exploding almost simultaneously up and down the Twenty-third Regiment’s line. The ground shook as though an earthquake was taking place, and the remaining trees still standing were blown to bits. Rocks and earth flew through the air, some landing inside the hole where Lieutenant Breckenridge and Colonel Hutchins were lying.

  “Sir!” shouted Lieutenant Breckenridge above the din. “I think this is the imminent attack you were referring to a few moments ago!”

  “Where’s your fucking walkie-talkie?”

  “It’s around here someplace!”

  They searched around the bottom of the hole and Lieutenant Breckenridge found it near the spot where Pfc. Delane had been lying. He handed it to Colonel Hutchins, who pressed it to his face, hit the button, and called his headquarters. Static filled his ear, but then he heard the voice of his operations officer, Major Cobb.

  “Cobb!” screamed Colonel Hutchins. “I’m with my recon platoon! If you haven’t called for artillery support yet, I’m going to court-martial you!”

  “I called!” replied Major Cobb. “It’s on the way!”

  “I’ll stay where I am. You’re in charge back there, understand?”

  “Yes, sir!”

  “Any questions?”

  “No, sir!”

  “Over and out!”

  Colonel Hutchins placed the walkie-talkie on the dirt beside him. He wanted to raise his head over the edge of the hole and see what was going on, but was afraid a chunk of shrapnel would shear his head off. He knew the Japs would attack as soon as the artillery barrage ended. The big question was when the artillery barrage would end.

  Lieutenant Breckenridge made sure his M 1 carbine had a full clip in it, and then he snapped his bayonet on the end. He rammed a round into the chamber and got set, because he knew the Japs were coming soon. Thinking about his men, recalling the position of each of them one by one, he realized that some were off on that detail to get more ammo. They probably were on open ground someplace, on their way to headquarters to get the ammo, when the barrage hit. And where in the hell was Craig Delane?

  Lieutenant Breckenridge heard the whistle of artillery shells overhead. They were going from west to east, which mean
t they were American shells on their way to the Japanese lines. A few seconds later he heard a crescendo of explosions to the east in the jungle where the Japs had fled at dawn.

  Colonel Hutchins smiled beside him. “Music to my ears!” he said.

  TWO . . .

  Pfc. Frankie La Barbara, Pfc. Billie Jones, and Private Victor Yabalonka were caught on open ground by the artillery barrage. They hit the dirt immediately as soon as the first shell landed, and then held their helmets tightly on their heads while pressing their faces into the dirt, their bodies trembling as the ground heaved underneath them.

  “Them fucking Japs!” screamed Frankie La Barbara, baring his teeth in rage.

  Next to him, the Reverend Billie Jones tried to figure out what he should do. He was in charge of the detail, and it seemed to him that he should do something, but he didn’t know what. When in doubt, he prayed, and since he was in doubt just then, he closed his eyes and whispered an improvised prayer to God, asking for guidance and help in the Japanese attack that he knew was coming.

  On the other side of the Reverend Billie Jones, Victor Yabalonka lay shivering, trying to overcome his fear. The night before had been his baptism of fire, and he’d wanted a reprieve so he could get his head together again, but now here was another battle; the Japs were coming back and he’d have to fight for his life hand to hand, if a Japanese artillery shell didn’t land on him first.

  Victor Yabalonka was an unusual man, even for the recon platoon, which received all the lunatics, criminals, and trouble-makers in the regiment. Before the war he’d been a longshoreman in San Francisco, and he’d got involved with the far left political wing of the Longshoremen’s Union. Although he’d never been a card-carrying Communist, he’d often been accused of being one. He’d been jailed many times for militant union activity, and he’d beaten the shit out of numerous scabs during various strikes.

  When the war broke out and he received his draft notice, he became a conscientious objector, because he thought the war was just another way for rich people to make money. But then people called him a coward, and he hated to be called that. In fact, it infuriated him, and he cracked the skulls of a few people whose mouths ran ahead of their common sense. Finally he decided to join the Army and organize the soldiers into a union so that they wouldn’t have to fight rich men’s wars.