Battle Cry (56 page)

“He’ll get his own turn and no more.”

“Aw, for Christ sake, Mac, his boondockers are soaked with blood. I know about all the trouble, but…”

“Speedy. Levin won’t quit. He’s got something to prove.”

“To me?”

“Why don’t you just forget it and get on your watch.”

Huxley pulled a fast one on us. He cut our sleep short and roused us at four in the morning. It was pitch dark except for the light of a quarter moon and the stars.

Groggy and bitter we broke camp and with a bar of chocolate we were on the highway in less than forty minutes. It was his plan to catch us half asleep so that the pace and pain would only be half felt. It worked. As we passed the town called Levin we were all in a stupor, like the rest of the column. There were a few halfhearted cracks about the link between Jake Levin and Levin Township but it was a sad attempt at humor.

Only knowing that the end of the hike was in sight kept me going that day. I felt the most miserable and pain-filled bastard alive and for the first time in my years as a Marine I was ready to throw in the sponge. I just didn’t have any guts left. Huxley had pounded them out of me. I was like a punch-drunk fighter, battered and almost out, only staying on his feet because the bell would ring soon and they could drag him to his corner. Foxton might be past the next hill or around the next bend.

For the first time we were not going parallel with the railroad. The route cut into hillier ground past Levin. The rising sun looked down on a gang of dazed zombies tramping and limping up the road.

With each break we gathered our guts for another last surge. Maybe another hour would find us at Foxton. Then another break and another. But Huxley showed no mercy. I pitied any poor bastards who ever set out with the idea of beating our time. And still the miles came and went. The early starting time would cut out the hour stop for noon chow—another Huxley innovation.

Let them try to beat us, crazy bastards,
let
them try. Let the sons of bitches kill themselves out-hiking Huxley’s Whores. I don’t suppose a man knows how much he can take. Many times in the hours before daylight I had felt I had reached the saturation point. Yet, each crisis passed and I was still half galloping along at the murderous pace—and nearly all of us were still on our feet.

Levin’s agony gave me renewed courage. I couldn’t order him to stop. The secret had to be kept, even if it killed him.

By 11:00 we began to sense that Foxton was close. The point broke out, almost double timing, in search of the town the name of which was now synonymous with Hell and Heaven. Hell to get there and Heaven to be there. By noon, houses cropped up along the roadside and at last from the crest of a hill we saw her dead ahead. The last two miles meant nothing now. It was almost anticlimax as we trudged through the streets of the sleepy farm town amid greetings from the citizens gathered at the windows and along the sidewalk. We went right through Foxton and were on the highway again.

I was seized with panic! Huxley might want to walk them to Palmerston North! I wouldn’t put it past him. The murmur in the column quelled as it swung off onto a dirt road and into a fenced-off field near the ocean.

Highpockets was wreathed in smiles as he checked the time. Of course there was work, but it didn’t seem so hard now. It was all over and we were relieved and damned proud. We slowly set up a camp, attended to our dilapidated feet, and a much needed mail call came through.

Aching but happy the battalion settled down. Spanish Joe borrowed a few chickens and a pig from a nearby farm and we had a fine barbecue. A day’s rest, a short field problem, and a return by truck to camp were in order. After a songfest around a campfire the boys decided they needed a little liquid refreshment in Foxton. Seabags reckoned it would be mighty unneighborly to walk up this far and not meet the local citizens. Our area was tightly guarded but Seabags was way ahead of the game. He had taken some message center armbands and planned to walk through the gates while “testing” the new SCRs for distance.

I wanted no part of it—only sleep. But I made them promise to watch the Injun and keep him from tearing the place apart. As I buttoned down they were already at the gates, cruising past the guards and giving phony test calls on the radios.

Doc Kyser limped into the command tent angrily. He snarled at Sam Huxley. “Have you lost your mind?” he shouted.

“Come in, Doctor. I was expecting you.”

“Huxley! I’ve sat by before on some of your little expeditions and said nothing. This time I’m putting my foot down!”

“Don’t put it down too hard, it’s probably sore.”

The Doc bent over the table and pointed his finger under the skipper’s nose. “Are you mad? You can’t hike them back to Russell. We lost twenty coming up—you’ll hospitalize the entire battalion. Don’t pull any crap on me.”

“Don’t worry, Doc,” Huxley said. “I promised them three-day leaves if we can beat our own time back to camp.”

“This is it. I’m going to the top. This is the last torture session I sit by and watch. I’ll get you court-martialed if it’s the last thing I do.”

“Sit down, dammit!” Huxley barked.

Kyser sat.

“If you can’t take it, get the hell out of my battalion, Doc. We’re in a war. These boys have to be tough. Yes, I’ll drive them and I’ll drive myself but I’ll see to it we are the best outfit in the Marine Corps. Not a man in the Second Battalion is going to be a straggler, not a man is going to die because he is weak. Get the hell out of my outfit if you don’t like it!”

The mild little doctor sagged. “God,” he whispered, “what’s the matter with you, man? What’s burning the insides out of you? You knew all along that we were going to hike both ways, didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

Kyser arose. “I’ve got a lot of work to do.” He turned for the tent flap.

“Doc,” Huxley said softly. The medic turned and lowered his eyes. “Sometimes I don’t like myself very much…this is one of them. I have to do it for these boys, Doc…you understand that, don’t you?”

“Yes,” Kyser said. “Thank God the Marines are filled with crazy officers like you. Maybe we would never make it otherwise. I’d better go.”

We were thunderstruck! The word passed like wildfire. Surely it was someone’s idea of a bum joke. We had hiked in the rain for him; we had given him his record—it just didn’t seem believable.

Then it dawned on us that it was no joke. Huxley was walking us back and striking for faster time. In the confused shock of the announcement a vicious anger such as I had never seen mounted. Till the last minute I prayed for a reprieve. The men snarled into their gear.

There was only one small compensation: Huxley would walk too. The point vowed to set a pace that would make even the iron man fall to his knees.

This crazy desire to bring Huxley down was just the thing he wanted. He knew that he’d have to throw us into a passionate rage to bring us up to the task.

The first day going back we were so goddam angry that we half ran, throwing all pain and caution to the winds. The pace was brutal and each step was matched with a foul curse along the column. Epitaphs flew, with our feet, southward. I had never seen men drive themselves so hard. Each break stimulated the insane desire to walk…walk…walk…I didn’t know if the squad could stay that way. The beat, beat, beat of leather on the paving might well beat our mood to jelly.

The end of the first day found us ahead of our former time. We cursed right through Levin and tramped to a spot between Ohau and Manakau. A brisk evening breeze came up and men began dropping with chills and fever, puking their guts out. Malaria was swooping in wholesale. We walked till dark and finally set up in a meadow outside Ohau.

Our nerve was quelled. A sudden shock of complete exhaustion hit the battalion. The men flopped and floundered and passed out in the shelters like invalids near death. Only a maniac would try to out-hike the miles covered that day—unless they had Huxley’s brother for a skipper.

The second day was different. A nightmare. The emotional burst was spent and now there was the reality of water and pack and road and pain and feet—what was left of them. Physical torture such as I had never felt before. Limping and groaning, we hit the bastard road after a breakfast of a chocolate bar. Every man in the Second Battalion called for the last ounce of strength that God gave him. The column began to fall apart. By noon we were moving at a snail’s pace.

Several more went down with malaria. Spanish Joe collapsed, done. During the break there was a ghostly stillness as we sat in the shelter of trees eating our ration. Huxley’s plan was going to backfire.

Huxley needed a miracle. There was a day and a half to go. At this rate he’d be lucky to walk in with fifty men. His purpose would be defeated.

We hit the road. Huxley limped like a cripple. His body looked all out of proportion and he trembled with each step. The word passed down the line that he was dragging his ass. But the point no longer had the urge or the energy to step up the pace and down him. Maybe he was putting on a show to keep the outfit intact? No, it was no show. He was in trouble and the slow, dragging steps were sending shocks of pain from his feet to his brain, almost paralyzing him with every step.

Highpockets is going to drop…Highpockets is going to drop…Highpockets is going to drop
…. This became the cadence as we slugged step after miserable step. A singsong, silent chant was on every lip and every eye was on Sam Huxley, whose face was wrenched in pain. He clenched his teeth to fight off the blackness creeping over him.
Huxley’s folding…Huxley’s folding
…. A mile, another. We neared Otaki again. Our pace was almost nil. Five men keeled over in quick succession. We pulled to a halt.

We were finished and we knew it. We’d never make the last day. Fifty men were out now and the time was past for fighting climax after climax. The saturation point was past. No miracle had happened.

Sam Huxley felt nothing in his long legs. He pinched and rubbed for an hour to get feeling back. He looked at his watch like a nervous cat from where he sat propped against a tree. His only order was to get up the galley along the highway quickly. It didn’t make sense to put it so close to the road. What was he up to? Suddenly he sprang to his feet and shouted. “Get your mess gear and line up along the road for chow, on the double!”

We staggered up the highway to where the field kitchen was. Eight hundred and fifty men, and the officers at the head of the line. Huxley kept looking at his watch every few seconds. Then he smiled as the sound of motors was heard coming over the Otaki Bridge. Huxley had passed his miracle!

Trucks rolled down near us. In them sat the men of Pawnee Blue, the Third Battalion was coming back from Foxton. On their asses!

“Candy-assed Marines!” A roar went up from us on the roadside, “Candy-assed Marines!” The red-faced men of the Third Battalion held their tongues, ashamed of their position.
“Candy asses…candy asses!”

“Say, what outfit is that?”

“Why that’s the Third Battalion, cousin.”

“Worthless as tits on a bull!”

“Ain’t they sweet!”

“Whatsamatter, candy asses? Road too hard for you boys?”

“Maybe they’re Doug’s soldiers.”

The trucks roared out of sight. I felt wonderful. I felt like bursting inside. Huxley was standing on top of a table, his hands on his hips. “Well,” he roared, “shall I call the trucks up for us, or does the Second Battalion walk?”

“The hell with chow!” A cheer went up.

“And when we hit the camp gate,” Huxley shouted over the din, “let’s show them what the best outfit in the Corps looks like!”

The surge of pride bustled like spring as we pushed south again. It was a fitting climax to the fantastic venture. We realized we were on the brink of a monumental feat that gyrenes would be talking about from Samoa to Frisco for a hundred years. The Second Battalion was near setting a record that would never be equaled anywhere.

As we worked the miles closer to camp, familiar landmarks came into view. We had pounded out the word with our feet that this was the greatest battalion in the Corps.

We passed Paraparamumu and the point gave the word to straighten up and look smart. Eight hundred and fifty men stiffened their backs and L.Q. Jones sang:

“Hidy tidy, Christ almighty.

Take a look and see,

Zim zam God damn,

Huxley’s Whores are we.”

It made chills go up and down the spine to hear the whole column break out singing. As we swung into the main gate of camp the road was lined with Marines from the Second and Eighth Regiments who had come to gawk at the hiking fools. The highway was filled with jeeps of officers from lieutenants to colonels, from every camp in the division. Their mouths hung open in stunned awe as the files of straight and smart-looking boys marched past them singing at the top of their lungs.

“We took a hike to Foxton,

Just the other day,

And just for the hell of it,

We walked the other way….”

Huxley sat with his bare feet on his desk near an open window. His field phone rang.

“Huxley.”

“Hello, Sam, this is Colonel Malcolm. Everyone at the Windsor is talking about it. Your outfit was remarkable. General Bryant is going to congratulate you personally. Remarkable, Sam, remarkable.”

“Thanks, Colonel Malcolm. Incidentally I have authorized three-day leaves for my boys.”

“Fine, Sam, when?”