Battle Cry (25 page)

As the man next to him moved off his stool, the bartender gave a signal. It was only a moment before a heavily made up, sleazy-looking bitch sauntered over and perched herself next to Ski.

“Hello, honey,” she said. The fun would be starting soon. I eyed the room for a quick exit. Ski turned his eyes slowly to her. He was wavering a little.

“Lonely, Marine?”

“Yeah, I’m lonely…yeah, I’m lonely.”

“Buy me a drink, honey?”

“Sure…got plenty, got plenty.” He turned to shove some change from the twenty across the bar. There was none. He reached in his wallet and from the fat roll peeled another bill and put it down. “Give the lady a drink and give me a survey. Make mine a double.”

The last one made his eyes do a little wild dance, then they started getting bleary. “You Susan?”

“Susan?”

“Yeah, Susan—you don’t look like Susan,” he said.

“Do you want me to be Susan, Marine?”

“Yeah…be Susan, will you? Please be Susan, lady.”

“Sure, Marine, I go for you, you’re sweet. What’s your name?”

“Ski…Ski…I’m a Feathermerchant…you Susan?”

“Sure, Ski, I’m Susan, drink up.”

“Why don’t you call me Connie if you’re Susan? She always calls me Connie…all the time, Connie, she says.”

I saw a tear trickle down his face. Even dead drunk it was hard for Ski to pretend that bawdy-looking whore was the girl he loved. There was a burst of laughter and screams of joy as the combo broke into a hot number. I felt myself getting sick of these stinking vultures, cashing in on the misery and loneliness of a lost kid. I wanted to start ripping the joint apart. I downed my beer and steadied for the move.

“Why don’t you finish that drink, Connie, and come up to my place?”

Ski leaned very close to her. “You…we…go someplace…alone…and turn off the lights and I could pretend you were Susan…would you hold me real tight, lady, and call me…Connie?”

“Sure, finish up your drink.” She nodded to the bartender, who deftly slipped the shot glass from the bar. I saw him empty a powder into it before he put it back in front of Ski.

“O.K., sister, that’s the ball game,” I said. “Come on, Ski, we’re going back to camp.”

“You can’t call me that!” she screamed at me in what was an obvious signal for a bum’s rush to get me out of there.

“Knock off the funny business, I’m taking him home—with his money.”

“I heard you, Marine,” the scarfaced bartender shouted at me. “That kind of talk to a lady don’t go in this place!”

I spun about quickly in time to feel something crash against my head. They sure worked neat. I was dazed, but they didn’t have me out. I felt several pairs of strange hands pick me up and rush me across the room. I tried to shake the fuzz from my brain but all I could hear was the wild beating of the combo. I was getting numb, fast…then it felt like I was sailing on a cloud….

Next I knew, Danny was standing over me, slapping my face. “Snap out of it, Mac.”

“Jesus! Look around the back on the double!”

Sister Mary took off at high port, then returned. “I saw them shoving off in a cab just as I got there. Ski was out cold,” he said.

I reeled to my feet. “Goddammit, I fouled up the detail. Let me think, let me think.” I steadied myself, trying to keep everything from spinning around.

“Let’s rush the goddam place and take it apart,” Andy said.

“No, we’re A.W.O.L.,” I said. “Andy, you look the oldest. Take my I.D. card and get in there. Get that bartender alone. The skinny one on the far end. Find out where they took Ski.”

Andy wasted no time. We fell back into the shadows as he moved to the door. We stood by restlessly for about ten minutes and then he came barreling out. “Come on, men, Ritz Hotel, Cannon and Clay.”

“Yeah,” I said, “I know the joint from the old days. Let’s grab a cab at the corner.”

We sped toward the waterfront.

“How on earth did you do it, Andy?” Marion asked.

“Easy,” Andy answered, rubbing his bruised knuckles, “easy. Anybody dealing in whores would deal in hot watches. I got him in the back room where they store beer cases. He thought he was going to look at some hot jewelry.”

“Very resourceful,” Marion mused.

“He be around to tip them off at the hotel?” Danny asked.

“Naw, he won’t be around for a while.”

“You didn’t kill him?”

“Naw, just worked him over. When he comes around he ain’t going to be able to get out of the room.” Andy flipped a key out of the window. “They’ll never hear him pounding over that band and the racket in that joint.”

Minutes later we stormed into the empty lobby of the third-rate hotel. The night clerk was caught off balance. I backed him up against the wall, holding him by the stacking swivel. “Real quick, friend—a little Marine and a brunette?”

Danny cocked his fist. The stunned man began shaking.

“What room, or do we start belting?”

“I ain’t looking for no trouble, Marines, I only work here.”

“You ain’t going to be living in about two minutes. Start whistling Dixie, Junior.”

“Room two-twenty, end of the hall on the right. Please, fellows, I got a family.”

I turned to Marion. “Sit here and keep this gentleman company, Mary. Sing out if anything comes through that lobby.”

Sister Mary placed a hand on the frightened clerk’s shoulder and sat him down. “Tell me, friend,” he said, “I would value your opinion in the eternal controversy on the relative merits of Brahms and Wagner. I’m a Brahms man myself, but I’m always ready to listen to a good argument.”

We dashed up the stairs, got oriented, and slipped the fair leather belts from about our waists. We rolled them around our fists, leaving about four inches of belt swinging free, with the heavy brass buckle at the end. We crept down the dimly lit hall and faced the door of Room 220.

Andy waved us aside. He took a run, leaped off his feet and hit the door, jumping Swede style, with the heels of his shoes. It buckled, then gave as Danny followed it up with a crash of his shoulder.

Ski lay prostrate over a bed. Standing over him, thumbing through his roll, stood a man, the whore’s pimp. The woman leaned against the dresser with a drink in her hand.

“Watch it!” A chair came down on Andy’s skull, dropping him to his knees. The woman made a dash for the door. Danny grabbed her and flung her down, hard. She started sobbing.

“Look out, Mac—he’s pulling a knife!”

I inched toward the man who had raised a knife in one hand while clutching Ski’s roll of bills in the other. The steel blade lashed out.

The man picked himself up, slowly. “Like I said, Danny, most people attack wrong with a knife.” I kicked him, lifted him, and polished him off quick, and took the money from his hand.

Andy was on his feet again. The woman crawled at our feet.

“Mercy, Marine!” she cried in a foreign accent.

“I’ll give you mercy!” Andy spat. “Stand up, bitch!”

We didn’t like the look on Andy’s face. It had
kill
written all over it. We calmed him down. “We’ve already had enough fun for one night, Swede…let’s hustle.”

I grabbed the woman and flung her against the wall. She collapsed to the deck. “If I see your face in this town again, sister, you won’t get off this easy.”

Marion burst into the room. “Shore Patrol coming up. You fellows are sure noisy.”

Andy threw Ski over his broad shoulder and we scuttled for the fire escape as the sound of whistles heralded the arrival of the law.

“Poor little bastard,” Andy said, as he passed Ski’s body through the window to me.

CHAPTER 6

THE PROGRESS
of the battalion was slow, painful, and riddled with mistakes. Every now and then a ray of light broke through. Little by little the begrudging attitude of the old salts lessened.

What really snapped us up was the news that came through on August 7, 1942. The first step on the long road back had been taken. The First Marine Division and attached units had landed on an island called Guadalcanal, in the Solomons…wherever the hell that was. We were all mighty proud that the Marines had been chosen to make the first American offensive of the war.

We were in the barracks when the news broke. First by radio, then a paper boy came through and quickly sold out. Danny was lying on his sack. He had a tortured expression on his face. It was twisted-like, to hold off tears. His newspaper fell to the deck and he left the room quickly and went to the porch outside. The list was on the first page. There, in a short column on the bottom, he saw it.

FIRST CASUALTY REPORT FROM SOLOMONS’ FIGHTING

August 8, 1942
(AP) Guadalcanal, BSI with the First Marine Division: Although fighting on Guadalcanal was comparatively free of casualties, sharp resistance was met by attached units landing on the islands across the waters of Skylark Channel; on Tulagi, Gavutu, and Tanembogo. The Navy Department makes this first American casualty list public:

KILLED IN ACTION:

Aarons, Jacob, Cpl., Newbury, Conn.

Burns, Joseph, Pvt., San Francisco, Calif.

Martinelli, Gino., Cpl., Monterey, Calif.

Nix, James B., Lt., Little Rock, Ark.

Norton, Milton, Pfc., Philadelphia, Penn….

WOUNDED IN ACTION:…

I, too, read the list and saw the light. The Marine Corps had not changed. War was still war and they would be dying, no matter what.

I gathered the squad about my bunk. “I just came from the First Sergeant’s office and here is the scoop you fellows have been pestering me about. We have four furloughs open for the squad.”

A murmur of a special kind of excitement passed through them. “There are nine of you fellows. Burnside and me don’t count. There will be two shifts. Two weeks and no travel time. There is only one fair way to do it, draw numbers.”

“Just a minute,” Andy interrupted. “Count me out. I…I ain’t got no special place to go. I just ain’t interested.”

“Me, too,” said Ski. The two walked away.

“All right,” I said. “I’ll make slips up and number them from one to seven. Low numbers are in. Numbers one and two will leave this Saturday.” I dropped the folded papers into my canteen cup and shook it up. I didn’t like it—someone was going to be left out. They tensely reached in and sat almost afraid to unroll their slips.

Lighttower’s face lit up. “I’m going back to the reservation,” he sighed.

“Number one,” L.Q. said.

“Iowa, here I come,” announced Seabags.

“I’m in,” Speedy Gray said.

“Number eight.” Spanish Joe said and shrugged and walked away. “Don’t make no difference, I’d of sold my trip.”

Marion and Danny managed a grin. “Lucky seven,” Danny said. “I guess you and me are it,” he said to Marion.

Just a bad break. Everyone wanted to go home. Danny and Marion went to Danny’s bunk. He began cleaning his Reising gun. In a few moments, L.Q. Jones walked over.

“Hey, Big Dan and Mary.”

“What?”

“Why don’t you two guys fight over my place? I live in L.A. and get home almost every weekend.”

“Naw,” Danny said, “I couldn’t take your furlough.”

“Mac, Pucchi, and Keats already said it is O.K.”

Danny turned to Marion.

“Look, Danny,” Marion said, “I know you won’t believe this, but I don’t want to go back until it is all over. I mean that.”

“I…I don’t know what to say.”

“Better start packing, Danny,” Marion said.

“But…but…”

“Just say we’re big and easy,” L.Q. said and slapped his back.

Danny arrived in Philadelphia from the airport. He went directly to the Thirtieth Street station and purchased a ticket for Baltimore and checked his canvas officer’s bag in a locker. He caught a cab at the stand outside the huge marble monument to travel.

“Where to, soldier?” the driver asked.

“I’m a Marine,” Danny barked.

“’Scuse me, didn’t notice. You guys are sure touchy about it. All the same country and the same war.”

“Three-fifty College Way,” Danny directed.

The cabbie’s incessant chatter fell on dumb ears. Danny felt uneasy as they whisked past the ancient brick walls and ivy covered buildings of what obviously was the University of Pennsylvania. In a side street, just a short walk from the school, the taxi pulled to a stop.

He found himself standing on the sidewalk looking up at a Victorian structure. The boards creaked beneath his feet as he slowly walked to the porch and into the lobby. He looked down the row of mailboxes and found the name:
Mr. and Mrs. Milton Norton.
He hesitated a moment, then read a sign under the bell:
Out of Order.
He shoved the heavy door open and began to go up a carpeted stairway with a big mahogany rail. He walked to the third floor, along the row of massive doors, and squinted to make out the nameplates. He stopped at the end of the hall a moment.

What can I say? What can I tell her? He took off his gloves and knocked. For a long period he stood there. Then the door opened slowly. A frail, pale-faced woman stood before him. She was plain but neat and had a wonderful calm about her. Twenty-seven or twenty-eight, Danny thought.

“Yes?” she asked softly.

“Mrs. Norton?”

“Yes.”

“I was a friend of your husband’s. I’m Danny Forrester.”

“Won’t you come in?”

She ushered him into the small apartment. It was modestly but well furnished. Untidy, but untidy in a very neat way. Untidy as a college professor might be. It was like Milton Norton. A large leather chair beneath a floor lamp, a desk littered with papers, shelves of books, including many whose covers were faded and aged beyond reading their titles. A bed without a backboard nestled in an alcove. It was covered with a spread and filled with colored cushions to serve as a couch in the daytime. A comfortable and homey room. Snug and friendly. The walls were covered with pictures of former students.

The room was full of peace of mind. The pale woman who stood in its center was peace of mind. Danny took off his cap and fidgeted.

“Won’t you sit down?”

“I can only stay a moment, Mrs. Norton. I’m on furlough from the coast, on the way to Baltimore.”