Once an Eagle (94 page)

“Are you on today?” he asked.

She nodded. “But I'll get a catnap this afternoon. I never need much sleep anyway.”

“You don't?”

“Five or six hours. We all got a lot less than that during the Moapora operation.”

“So did we.”

They smiled at each other a moment. It would be easy to fall in love with this girl, the thought swept over him. After all these years, all the alarums and excursions; terribly, fatally easy …

But he was not Ben. He could not slip away somewhere and climb into bed with her, as Ben had with Hallie. There was Tommy, and the kids, and all the patterns of allegiance and obligation with which his life was invested. The fierce, unreckoning need to touch, to assert the importance of his imperiled self still thrust at his vitals; but he forced it back.

“—I'd like to see you again,” he said awkwardly. “May I?” She nodded; she was absolutely motionless. A moment longer they hung there, bound in this curious air of expectancy, of suspenseful, unresolved colloquy that hummed between them in the Queensland night. Then he stepped forward and kissed her—a strange, solemn kiss, a ridiculous kiss like an older brother's—and released her.

She gave a little sigh, as though she'd been awakened in her sleep; then straightened and said, “Good night.”

“Good night.” He watched her move off toward the gate—the fine, easy carriage, her head high. Tall girl. He could see her all at once at fifteen, with that deep gold hair in braids and freckles over her nose and her ears too big, chewing gum and reading. The MP came to attention and saluted; she returned the salute smartly and moved out of sight. You God damned fool, he told himself; there was a strange constriction in his throat. The sentry was staring at him again, and he turned away and got in behind the wheel …

 

“I'm going in
for a swim,” Hallie Burns was telling them now. “What's the matter with you cows? All you ever want to do is lie around in a bloody torpor …”

“We're storing up strength,” Ben replied. “For the ordeals to come.”

“You can't store it up. It's like underground water: if you let it go by, it's gone forever. Come on in with me, Joyce.”

“All right.”

“Are they like all the other Americans, Joyce? these military blokes?”

“No—they're a race apart. They don't know what's going on in the rest of the country. They live like the Baltic barons—you know, their own preserves, their own codes.”

“Blasted aristocrats.”

“Worse. Much worse. Unnatural appetites.”

“Nurse Tanahill, you're confined to quarters …”

“Yes
sir!
”

Damon smiled at the desultory ritual banter, studying Joyce with the almost merciless scrutiny one occasionally visits on a good friend. He found her more appealing outdoors, in the warm sunlight; her large-limbed, indolent grace seemed more suited to sea and sand and green upslanting fields. Behind them there was a sudden chorus of yells and cheering. He turned his head, saw the flying runner, the capering, gesticulating figures. Long drive. He picked up a small stone and tossed it loosely in his palm. The mantle of languor still hung over him. Another three days, or four, they would get the word and the laborious machinery would start up all over again—the preparation of attack plans and manifests and codes and troop dispositions, the pattern of arguments and rehearsals and post mortems that had only one end in view: the seizure of enemy-held territory and the destruction of the garrison force. So that the pins and arrows and black lines on the maps could move forward another stage …

“What are those fences doing out there?” Ben asked, pointing. “Those low wood and wire backstops, there?”

“Oh, it's an old shark net, I guess,” Hallie answered.

“Sharks? You've got sharks swimming around here?”

“Bloody fine chance!” She laughed saucily. “Come on, Joyce. Let these lizards lie around on their backsides.” She ran to the water, her feet lifting and falling on the sand. Joyce followed her more slowly, swaying as the water reached her thighs, then dropping forward out of sight, to reappear a few yards farther on, kicking a soft white froth. The two men watched them in silence.

In another tone Ben said: “What did Sutherland say?”

“Full training schedule. Range, conditioning hikes, field problems. The works.”

“Jesus, I wish those sons of bitches in operations could be out there in the boondocks,” Ben went on crossly. “Crawling through the muck and ducking mortar fire. Just for a week. I wish—” He subsided again. “Ours but to wawl and cry. What do you think we'll draw, Sam?”

“I don't know. I think Madang, or Ulingan.”

“Jesus, I hope we don't draw New Britain. Dick says coast watcher estimates put a hundred and sixty thousand Japs at Rabaul.” He scrubbed his scalp feverishly and said in slow, comic outrage: “A hundred and—
sixty
—
thousand …
”

“Come on in, Sam,” Joyce was calling. “It's wonderful! You'll regret it …”

The girls were standing in the shallow water; they looked slim and glistening and vivid, like the first women at the birth of the world. Hallie pointed and they both looked off up the coast, shading their eyes. He would always remember this moment: the bright, lithe limbs against the blue sea, the pale, smoky Australian sky.

“Come on, you two! It's so warm and lovely …”

“What the hell, Sam. Let's go join them.”

“Right.”

The two men got to their feet and walked toward the water.

 

12 Jan 43.
Duke Pulleyne roared into camp yesterday. Face like a shingle hatchet, smooth silver hair, spots of fiery color high on his cheeks. Cigar chewed half through, long-barreled .38 in an open holster. Dashing cavalryman. “Damon! Brilliant job, brilliant. How many of the little slopehead bastards did you starch? Great stuff. What shape's the Division in?” Just like that. Full of piss and vinegar, one of those perpetually wound-up types. Never heard a word I said. Well, Christ knows he'll need all the p & v he's got up there on the old Guinea Hen, as Jackson calls it. Tore around like a couple of drunken firemen, disrupted Hoyt's batt working on bunker assaults, some of 484th later. Pulleyne not impressed. “What's the matter with them? They fart around like a bunch of tired old men …” I said: “They
are
tired, Duke.” “Well, they better shake the lead and get cracking. They're soldiers—with a big, dirty job to do.” How true. He's picked up a crypto-British bush jacket made of some shiny golden chino, with patch pockets: banks of ribbons, oversize stars. Doesn't know quite how to take me—kept vacillating between deferential queries about Moapora and profane directives on How to Run a Lean and Mean Division. Never had combat command before—went up to take over a company in the Wild Wests on Nov 10, last war. Training divisions at Bragg and heartily sick of it. Can't say I blame him. Only why did they send him OUT HERE?

Immediate clash of personalities today between him and Dick—could see it building. Tart sober Yankee, flashy impulsive Virginian. “Any man that needs more than three minutes to make up his mind about
anything
hasn't got any God damn business leading men.” Wants to hold a review, says he wants Div to get to know him. Not much doubt that they're going to do
that.
Maybe it's a good idea: I doubt it. There isn't all the time in the world.

Div coming back, slowly. Nothing succeeds like success. To coin a phrase.
Now
the supplies roll in, T/O&E swelling. Nobody would have been caught dead with us three months ago.

Donny arrived in UK last week. Short ltr, full of forced casualness, new worlds, etc. Suddenly felt afraid, reading it. Hope to God they give them plenty of time to shake down. Wished we'd been closer than we were. A soldier never gets to know his kids well enough: you should be able to but you don't—military life is too unsettled, confused, full of external artificialities to permit it. No word from Tommy now for five weeks. She will always cling to the idea I influenced him—she'll never believe I tried to dissuade him in all those ltrs last fall, once right in middle of Moapora mess. Begged him at least to stay on until graduation. Wish I'd met the girl—she seems like a good sort. He's got his mother's flair for violent extremes, impulsive action. What changes this past year has made! All the agony, and ambition, and uprooting—and we've only just got started …

 

6 Feb 43.
Got word Tuesday from SWPC HQ: Wokai peninsula. Big surprise all around. Bypassing Madang, Aitape. Long pow-wow most of yesterday. High cliffs running along peninsula. We've drawn Red Beach, are to drive inland and take airfield; Swannie's Div to land on Green west of peninsula, and pinch it off, take it from land side. Lot of complicated verbiage which, boiled down, means: we will be under intense artillery fire all the way to the strip, until peninsula is reduced. Much walla-walla over whether there were or were not 2 trails from cove to airfield: not even God seems to know. Maps are fantastic—they seem to be based on some myopic missionary's abstract of a drunk's interpretation of a New Guinea headhunter's fancies. Aerial reconnaissance is even worse. Ben is right, the only
sane
place to fight is in that clean, well-charted rectangle Namur-Saarbrücken-Nancy-St. Quentin, where they've been slaughtering each other since Romans and Charlemagne, and every bloody hill and patch of woods has had a monograph written about it.

Pulleyne in a wrangle with Hodl. “450 tons—you people get too worked up about supply levels. The thing to do is get in there fast and nail down that airstrip.” Glaring at us, wagging his handsome silver head. “I want to tell you, there's too much worrying going on in this lash-up. Worrying about supply and flanks and everything else.” Ben and Frenchy exchanging disgusted glances. Well: Duke's good in some ways—he's shaking the outfit up. If only he didn't keep going off at half-cock. Read off a lieutenant yesterday for negligence—and then it turned out man wasn't even involved in the exercise. Wanted to put Div in field scarves “to sharpen their esprit.” I told him he was OUT OF HIS MIND, they would mutiny and massacre us all, commandeer a boat and start for home. He muttered and rumbled and chewed on his cigar.

It finally came out this evening after chow. “Sam, whose Division is this, do you know?” Didn't know what he was driving at, and said so. “All I hear is Damon this and Damon that, and how-Sam-did-it.” Looking at me like a fierce old turkey cock. “That's what I want to know: are you going to be running this lash-up or am I?” I said: “General, I intend to carry out your orders to the best of my ability. If I overstep my authority and try to run the Division, I hope you'll relieve me at once. On my part, if I feel you are in error about some matter, I will bring it to your attention directly and promptly, and to no one else.” “Fair enough,” he said, and muttered: “There's one hell of a lot of old-home-week and down-memory-lane in this command …” Well, there is: but what does he expect? And it's his problem, not mine. Been having my own battles to fight.

Did get one thing hammered through: two canteens for every GI. Hodl hit the roof. “I haven't that many in stock.” “Requisition them, then.” “Sam, they'll never carry that extra weight.” “Wouldn't you?” He looked at me nervously. “I don't know.” “Well, I do,” I told him. “I've taken a little poll with most of the Double-7 and the project is running about 40 to 1 in favor. Let's do it.” Still thinks it's unnecessary, a whim. Why are G-4s always so UNIMAGINATIVE???

Had a dream about Joyce last night toward morning. A beach like Monterey with heavy, slow surf and boats capsizing everywhere, terrible mortar fire. Got caught on wire, couldn't get free, filled with panic, sinking in ooze. Joyce gliding by in lovely outrigger with candy-striped sails, two men (couldn't recognize) hugging her, she laughing and having a great time. I cried out, they noticed me, one of the men queried her. She replied: “Well, I can't save him. He's stopping. It's too bad, but that's how it is.” Woke up shaking. So much for dream life.

Fine letter from Dad: may be given combat command in Africa, where things are not going too well. To put it mildly. Old Man really elated, almost giddy. “For God's sake DON'T tell Tommy or she'll have forty fits. Brent said: ‘Of course it'll mean a bust.' ‘Suits me fine,' I told him, ‘whenever you say.' But I don't think they'll want an old bat like me.” By God, I wish he was out here running the Salamander. I'd feel a lot better about things.

 

16 Mar 43.
Ready as we'll ever be. I guess. Not enough TIME. Not nearly enough, especially for landings. Rehearsal off Castlereigh an unholy fiasco. Hoyt's people landed ½ mile down the coast, message centers hours behind, everyone yowling and howling and generally carrying on. Maybe a bad practice means a good game.

Ben wonderful with Rgt. Standing on jeep hood wearing that wrinkled patrol cap with the bill turned up like Donald Duck. “Now in case anybody's in any doubt about it, this is the outfit that took the first real estate from the Jap Empire that was ever taken by
anybody!
We took the first one, and we're going to take the last one.” A murmur, tentative: not knowing quite how to take this. Ben watching them, hands on his hips. “All right, now let's hear it: who's going to win this war?” “We are … ” “Wrong!” Glowering at them. “The buck-ass sad-sack privates are going to win it!” A roar. “With a little help from the NCOs …” Another roar, louder. Had them with him now. Waving my old '03 I gave him when he took over. “Now I'm going to be on that beach right along with you, and I'm going to be carrying this oh-three. I stole it from General Damon after they slapped so much rank on him he couldn't be seen around with it any longer. It's going to be noisy as all hell on that beach, and you know and I know those Nips are going to be trying for officers—and I want to look just like the rest of you …” A terrific roar now: would never know the battered old Double-Seven. Pounding each other on the back and throwing their helmets in the air.