Soldiers Pay (2 page)

“Come on, come on. Don't lose your nerve now. G'wan and jump.”

“Help!” the man shrieked into the vain wind and “help!” the conductor chorused, clinging to him, and two alarmed passengers and the porter came to his assistance. They overcame Yaphank and drew the now thoroughly alarmed man into the car. The conductor slammed shut the window.

“Gentlemen,” he addressed the two passengers, “will you sit here and keep them from putting him out that window? I am going to put them all off as soon as we reach Buffalo. I'd stop the train and do it now, only they'd kill him as soon as they got him alone. Henry,” to the porter, “call the train conductor and tell him to wire ahead to Buffalo we got two crazy men on board.”

“Yeh, Henry,” Yaphank amended to the negro, “tell 'em to have a band there and three bottles of whisky. If they ain't got a band of their own, tell 'em to hire one. I will pay for it.” He dragged a blobby mass of bills from his pocket and stripping off one, gave it to the porter. “Do you want a band too?” he asked Lowe. “No,” answering himself, “ no, you don't need none. You can use mine. Run now,” he repeated.

“Yas suh, Cap'm.” White teeth were like a suddenly opened piano.

“Watch 'em, men,” the conductor told his appointed guards. “You, Henry!” he shouted, following the vanishing white jacket.

Yaphank's companion, sweating and pale, was about to become ill; Yaphank and Lowe sat easily respectively affable and belligerent. The newcomers touched shoulders for mutual support, alarmed but determined. Craned heads of other passengers became again smugly unconcerned over books and papers and the train rushed on along the sunset.

“Well, gentlemen,” began Yaphank conversationally.

The two civilians sprang like plucked wires and one of them said, “Now, now,” soothingly, putting his hand on the soldier. “Just be quiet, soldier, and we'll look after you. Us Americans appreciates what you've done.”

“Hank White,” muttered the sodden one.

“Huh?” asked his companion.

“Hank White,” he repeated.

The other turned to the civilian cordially. “Well, bless my soul, if here ain't old Hank White in the flesh, that I was raised with! Why, Hank! We heard you was dead, or in the piano business or something. You ain't been fired, have you? I notice you ain't got no piano with you.”

“No, no,” the man answered in alarm, “you are mistaken. Schluss is my name. I got a swell line of ladies' underthings.” He produced a card.

“Well, well, ain't that nice. Say,” he leaned confidentially toward the other, “you don't carry no women samples with you? No? I was afraid not. But never mind. I will get you one in Buffalo. Not buy you one, of course: just rent you one, you might say, for the time being. Horace,” to Cadet Lowe, “where's that bottle?”

“Here she is, Major,” responded Lowe, taking the bottle from beneath his blouse. Yaphank offered it to the two civilians.

“Think of something far, far away, and drink fast,” he advised.

“Why, thanks,” said the one called Schluss, tendering the bottle formally to his companion. They stooped cautiously and drank. Yaphank and Cadet Lowe drank, not stooping.

“Be careful, soldiers,” warned Schluss.

“Sure,” said Cadet Lowe. They drank again.

“Won't the other one take nothing?” asked the heretofore silent one, indicating Yaphank's travelling companion. He was hunched awkwardly in the corner. His friend shook him and he slipped limply to the floor.

“That's the horror of the demon rum, boys,” said Yaphank solemnly and he took another drink. And Cadet Lowe took another drink. He tendered the bottle.

“No, no,” Schluss said with passion, “not no more right now.”

He don't mean that,” Yaphank said, “he just ain't thought.” He and Lowe stared at the two civilians. “Give him time: he'll come to hisself.”

After a while the one called Schluss took the bottle.

“That's right,” Yaphank told Lowe confidentially. “For a while I thought he was going to insult the uniform. But you wasn't, was you?”

“No, no. They ain't no one respects the uniform like I do. Listen, I would of liked to fought by your side, see? But someone got to look out for business while the boys are gone. Ain't that right?” he appealed to Lowe.

“I don't know,” said Lowe with courteous belligerence, “I never had time to work any.”

“Come on, come on,” Yaphank reprimanded him, “all of us wasn't young enough to be lucky as you.”

“How was I lucky?” Lowe rejoined fiercely.

“Well, shut up about it, if you wasn't lucky. We got something else to worry about.”

“Sure,” Schluss added quickly, “we all got something to worry about.” He tasted the bottle briefly and the other said:

“Come on, now, drink it.”

“No, no, thanks, I got a plenty.”

Yaphank's eye was like a snake's. “Take a drink, now. Do you want me to call the conductor and tell him you are worrying us to give you whisky?”

The man gave him the bottle quickly. He turned to the other civilian. “What makes him act so funny?”

“No, no,” said Schluss. “Listen, you soldiers drink if you want: we'll look after you.”

The silent one added like a brother and Yaphank said:

“They think we are trying to poison them. They think we are German spies, I guess.”

“No, no! When I see a uniform, I respect it like it was my mother.”

“Then come on and drink.”

Schluss gulped and passed the bottle. His companion drank also and sweat beaded them.

“Won't he take nothing?” repeated the silent one, and Yaphank regarded the other soldier with compassion.

“Alas, poor Hank!” he said, “poor boy's done for, I fear. The end of a long friendship, men.” Cadet Lowe said sure, seeing two distinct Hanks, and the other continued. “Look at that kind, manly face. Children together we was, picking flowers in the flowery meadows; him and me made the middle-weight mule-wiper's battalion what she was; him and me devastated France together. And now look at him.

“Hank! Don't you recognize this weeping voice, this soft hand on your brow? General,” he turned to Lowe, “will you be kind enough to take charge of the remains? I will deputize these kind strangers to stop at the first harness factory we pass and have a collar suitable for mules made of dogwood with the initials H. W. in forget-me-nots.”

Schluss in ready tears tried to put his arm about Yaphank's shoulders. “There, there, death ain't only a parting. Brace up: take a little drink, then you'll feel better.”

“Why, I believe I will,” he replied; “you got a kind heart, buddy. Fall in when fire call blows, boys.”

Schluss mopped his face with a soiled, scented handkerchief and they drank again. New York in a rosy glow of alcohol and sunset streamed past breaking into Buffalo, and with fervent new fire in them they remarked the station. Poor Hank now slept peacefully in a spittoon.

Cadet Lowe and his friend being cold of stomach, rose and supported their companions. Schluss evinced a disinclination to get off. He said it couldn't possibly be Buffalo, that he had been to Buffalo too many times. Sure, they told him, holding him erect, and the conductor glared at them briefly and vanished. Lowe and Yaphank got their hats and helped the civilians into the aisle.

“I'm certainly glad my boy wasn't old enough to be a soldier,” remarked a woman passing them with difficulty, and Lowe said to Yaphank:

“Say, what about him?”

“Him?” repeated the other, having attached Schluss to himself.

“That one back there,” Lowe indicated the casual.

“Oh, him? You are welcome to him, if you want him.”

“Why, aren't you together?”

Outside was the noise and smoke of the station. They saw through the windows hurrying people and porters, and Yaphank moving down the aisle answered:

“Hell, no. I never seen him before. Let the porter sweep him out or keep him, whichever he likes.”

They half dragged, half carried the two civilians and with diabolical cunning Yaphank led the way through the train and dismounted from a day coach. On the platform Schluss put his arm around the soldier's neck.

“Listen, fellows,” he said with passion, “y' know m' name, y' got addressh. Listen, I will show you 'Merica preshates what you done. Ol' Glory ever wave on land and sea. Listen, ain't nothing I got soldier can't have, nothing. N'if you wasn't soldiers I am still for you, one hundred pershent. I like you. I swear I like you.”

“Why, sure,” the other agreed, supporting him. After a while he spied a policemen and he directed his companion's gait toward the officer. Lowe with his silent one followed. “Stand up, can't you?” he hissed, but the man's eyes were filled with an inarticulate sadness, like a dog's. “Do the best you can, then,” Cadet Lowe softened, added, and Yaphank, stopped before the policeman, was saying:

“Looking for two drunks, Sergeant? These men were annoying a whole trainload of people. Can't nothing be done to protect soldiers from annoyance? If it ain't top sergeants, it's drunks.”

“I'd like to see the man can annoy a soldier,” answered the officer. “Beat it, now.”

“But say, these men are dangerous. What are you good for, if you can't preserve the peace?”

“Beat it, I said. Do you want me to run all of you in?”

“You are making a mistake, Sergeant. These are the ones you are looking for.”

The policeman said, Looking for? regarding him with interest.

“Sure. Didn't you get our wire? We wired ahead to have the train met.”

“Oh, these are the crazy ones, are they? Where's the one they were trying to murder?”

“Sure, they are crazy. Do you think a sane man would get hisself into this state?”

The policeman looked at the four of them with a blase eye. “G'wan, now. You're all drunk. Beat it, or I'll run you in.”

“All right. Take us in. If we got to go to the station to get rid of these crazy ones, we'll have to.”

“Where's the conductor of this train?”

“He's with a doctor, working on the wounded one.”

“Say, you men better be careful. Whatcher trying to do—kid me?”

Yaphank jerked his companion up. “Stand up,” he said, shaking the man. “Love you like a brother,” the other muttered. “Look at him,” he said, “look at both of 'em. And there's a man hurt on that train. Are you going to stand here and do nothing—?”

“I thought you was kidding me. These are the ones, are they?” He raised his whistle and another policeman ran up. “Here they are, Ed. You watch 'em and I'll get aboard and see about that dead man. You soldiers stay here, see?”

“Sure, Sergeant,” Yaphank agreed. The officer ran heavily away and he turned to the civilians. “All right, boys. Here's the bellhops come to carry you out where the parade starts. You go with them and me and this other officer will go back and get the conductor and the porter. They want to come, too.”

Schluss again took him in his arms.

“Love you like a brother. Anything got's yours. Ask me.”

“Sure,” he rejoined. “Watch 'em, Cap, they're crazy as hell. Now, you run along with this nice man.”

“Here,” the policeman said, “you two wait here.”

There came a shout from the train and the conductor's face was a bursting bellowing moon. “Like to wait and see it explode on him,” Yaphank murmured. The policeman supporting the two men hurried toward the train. “Come on here,” he shouted to Yaphank and Lowe.

As he drew away Yaphank spoke swiftly to Lowe .

“Come on, General,” he said, “let's get going. So long boys. Let's go, kid.”

The policeman shouted, “Stop, there!” but they disregarded him, hurrying down the long shed, leaving the excitement to clot about itself, for all of them.

Outside the station in the twilight the city broke sharply its skyline against the winter evening and lights were shimmering birds on motionless golden wings, bell notes in arrested flight; ugly everywhere beneath a rumoured retreating magic of colour.

Food for the belly, and winter, though spring was somewhere in the world, from the south blown up like forgotten music. Caught both in the magic of change they stood feeling the spring in the cold air, as if they had but recently come into a new world, feeling their littleness and believing too that lying in wait for them was something new and strange. They were ashamed of this and silence was unbearable.

“Well, buddy,” and Yaphank slapped Cadet Lowe smartly on the back, “that's one parade we'll sure be A.W.O.L. from, huh?”

II

Who sprang to be his land's defence

And has been sorry ever since?

Cadet!

Who can't date a single girl

Long as kee-wees run the world?

Kay—det!

With food in their bellies and a quart of whisky snugly under Cadet Lowe's arm they boarded a train.

“Where are we going?” asked Lowe. “This train don't go to San Francisco, do she?”

“Listen,” said Yaphank, “my name is Joe Gilligan. Gilligan, G-i-l-l-i-g-a-n, Gilligan, J-o-e, Joe; Joe Gilligan. My people captured Minneapolis from the Irish and taken a Dutch name, see? Did you ever know a man named Gilligan give you a bum steer? If you wanta go to San Francisco, all right. If you wanta go to St. Paul or Omyhaw, it's all right with me. And more than that, I'll see that you get there. I'll see that you go to all three of 'em if you want. But why'n hell do you wanta go so damn far as San Francisco?”

“I don't,” replied Cadet Lowe. “I don't want to go anywhere especially. I like this train here—far as I am concerned. I say, let's fight this war out right here. But you see, my people live in San Francisco. That's why I am going there.”