by Anton Myrer
“Ought to be a lot of things,” Damon said.
Bowcher snorted again. “Think we’ll fool ’em any?”
“Wouldn’t be surprised. If they’re as fouled up as we are, we can’t miss.”
Bowcher grinned and shook his head; Lieutenant Feltner looked shoreward anxiously. They were part of the first joint amphibious maneuvers ever held in divisional strength—an operation already marked by confusion, mountainous paperwork, and interminable wrangling with the Navy, who had stonily insisted they had neither the ships nor assault facilities. As executive officer of Third Battalion, 477th Regiment, Damon was taking a company and supporting units ashore in a diversionary feint to draw defenders away from the main landing on Monterey Beach, east of the commercial pier. They’d had eighteen days’ training but it was not enough—not nearly enough. A Marine Corps colonel named Buckman had told them amphibious assault was the most difficult of all operations—except amphibious withdrawal, which was even worse—and it was easy to see why. There were a hundred thousand problems: combat loading of the vessels, debarkation of troops to the landing craft, the weather, hitting strange beaches without fixed positions—
“How long are we going to be at this?” Millis asked no one. “All this rolling around?”
“That’s what she said,” Jackson retorted, “when the bed broke.” There was a chorus of laughter, and someone said:
“Join the Navy, and be a frog …”
They hung in the swells, wallowing and sinking. Millis was sick all over his jacket and the pack of De Luca the radio operator, who swore at him.
“—Sorry, Vinnie,” Millis croaked feebly, wiping his lips. “Real sorry.”
“You stupid bastard. How’m I going to get that off?”
“Didn’t know—it was going to happen.”
“Next time put your head over the God damn side …”
They had trained for several days on the float at Lake Hadley, using wooden pontoon boats. But the lake had been calm; the reflections of the tall pines had hung in the water like green glass. Here the wind was biting cold—now and then the spray lashed them lightly; the raw, greasy fumes from the boat’s engines made them all cough. Three planes went over, Navy fighters in a tight, fat clump, heading toward Point Piños.
“What the hell are we waiting for?” Dougherty demanded.
“For you to start puking!” Jackson yelled at him, laughing.
The coxswain, a tall man in a pea jacket standing at the raised platform at the stern in front of a canvas screen, called something, and the motors roared; Damon saw him shove his hip against the snakelike pipe of the tiller. The assault waves had formed now, raggedly. Eight forty-two. Not too bad. The launch, moving with the wind and waves, had fallen into a tight, slewing motion that was exhilarating at the same time it made him feel queasy. Starker, a sergeant and ex-merchant seaman, was watching him slyly to see if he was going to be sick. What a boot for the Battalion that would be—old Sad Sam, the Night Clerk, the hiking fool, flashing his hash all over the command! He took several slow, deep breaths, gritted his teeth and grinned back at Starker, who all at once looked rather green around the gills himself.
“Hoo-eeeee!” Jackson yelled. “Ya-hoooeeeee!”—a piercing, racketing rebel yell that had half a dozen of the men grinning.
“All right, Jackson,” Lieutenant Feltner called, but without force.
They swept on, the sunlight dazzling on the water, the winter air fresh and bitter, smelling of salt and old iron. To the west the pine hills behind Monterey lay in a dense feathery green, and off to their left Mount Toro rose up gray and gaunt and sere, like the hide of a wolf. The beach, far away, looked pure white. Here and there the morning sun flashed in the windows of houses along Alvarado Street like mirrors tilted. Idyllic. An idyllic place to hold a landing exercise. Japanese infantry might be looking at it from this vantage point, someday. Would they? It was possible; just possible …
Little black puffs bloomed from back of Del Monte Heights, and Sergeant Bowcher pointed and said: “Spotted us.” Damon nodded. Simulated artillery. While he watched, a TBF came low along the shore, smoke belching from its tail in a pretty white rolling plume that spread and thinned, churning on itself. They were swinging off to the east now, running at an angle to the shore, racing on the blue water, pitching and rolling. His arm was tired holding to the gunwale. Millis was sick again, bent over, retching between his knees. My God, he thought, that boy must have eaten five breakfasts this morning. Now Boretz beside him was sick, and Martinez; it was catching. Ahead of them the smoke was breaking into rifts and snatches, torn by the wind, and through it he could catch glimpses of the oil tanks. They were nearer now, much nearer; he could make out the scaling ladders running up their sides. Here and there stands of eucalyptus were visible, looking ragged and yellow against the pines.
There was a shout; he looked aft. The Navy chief in the well below the tiller platform held up three fingers. Three hundred yards. Sergeant Bowcher raised his head and roared: “All right. Load and lock! Load and lock!” Damon watched the platoon fumble with the clips of blank cartridges, their rifles clashing against each other as the boat dipped and swayed. This would need rehearsing, too.
Now he could see the surf. It looked heavy—wide, frothy fans sweeping up the beach and sliding away again; a ponderous, looping motion, hidden by the next grainy, emerald shoulder of breaker. They clearly hadn’t been expecting anything like this in the operations room at six this morning. Feltner was shouting some instructions to Sergeant Bowcher and he gripped Boretz’s arm and called: “Keep a good grip on that lifeline when you go over the side. Along the gunwale. Here!” Boretz and Millis both nodded; they were looking at him as though he’d just asked them to jump into a cauldron of flaming oil. “And your rifle high—over your head!”
The launch lifted more steeply now, pitching, the slick combers sliding past at the gunwale’s edge and dropping astern. The coxswain shouted something, and the sailor in the bow leaped up on the stem, a mooring line coiled in one hand. They lifted wildly, set down with a thud that jarred their spines, lifted again. The seaman was gone. Damon glanced aft once more, saw the chief’s arm shoot up. Sergeant Bowcher was roaring over the dense thunder of the surf, “Over—you—go!”
Damon flung himself up and over, pivoting on his left arm. The water took him like a million fiery needles and he gasped—he had no idea it would be this cold. His feet hit solidly, then went out from under him the next instant as a wall of water swept over his head. Damn. This was more than they’d bargained for. Gripping the rope he let the surge carry him toward the bow, remembering with an almost giddy gratitude Colonel Pearson’s insistence on the installation of lifelines on all launches, much to the disgust of the Navy. Something struck his thigh; he turned, saw a hand with a rifle moving abreast of him, not five feet away, then nothing, then a legginged foot spin into view. He lunged out, hanging onto the line, reached into the swirling white froth and clutched something—an intrenching tool, then an arm; hauled the figure up by main strength. Millis, his mouth gaped wide, eyes rolling frantically. They slammed back upon the bow; the boy came against him with a rush that banged their helmets together like dulled cymbals. Millis was gripping his neck and shoulder in a paroxysm. Damon laughed in spite of himself. “Stay with it now! Keep your mouth closed!… Get a drink?”
Millis went into a fit of coughing, wagging his head. “—Terrible!”
Damon laughed again. “Hang on to that rope!” He grabbed another man named Reidy and pulled him back to the boat’s side. The power of the surf was astonishing: it had the ponderous, irresistible force of earth moving, of a landslide. He caught hold of the mooring on the next surge, struggled forward—went to his knees in the undertow, got up and ran out on the flat beach. The sailor on shore, minus his white hat, was pulling with all his might on the painter. Looking back he saw a dozen men in the water, clinging to the lifeline, not moving; with their tin hats and glaring eyes they looked like a row of kids hiding under s
ome basins.
“Come on!” he roared; he couldn’t keep from grinning. “Get going now, come on! It won’t get any easier …”
Two other boats were ashore. Another had broached and was rolling dangerously, its whalelike underside looking raw and vulnerable. Once out of the water it was easy: the sand was a light tawny color, hard as clay baked in the sun—nothing like the Atlantic beaches. The platoon was coming ashore now, sinking and swaying in the surf, bunched on the mooring line or floundering in the water like drunks trying to find their way home; the launch rocked and banged cruelly, the helmsman fighting the tiller, trying to keep her from broaching. There was a better way to do this; there had to be. If there were enemy infantry in those dunes—if there were only two machine guns—they would all of them be dead or drowned by now …
He ran up the beach, shivering, glad of the exercise, the delicious freedom from the massive dragging weight of the water. Up ahead he could see four, five men running swiftly. There was no sound of firing. Good. Or possibly it was a trap. To his right he could see Cavallon and DiMaestri and several others milling around and talking to one another excitedly: they had just braved the terrors of the deep, and now they wanted to exchange tales of comfort and glory.
“Starker!” he shouted, catching sight of the Sergeant. “Get those men going! What are they waiting for—champagne?” Making a fist he pumped his arm rapidly up and down. Jesus: what would they do in the real thing?
He loped through a gap in the dunes, where pebbles winked like onyx jewels in the sunlight. His teeth were chattering but his body was warming up and he ran hard, feeling in high spirits after all the paper work and delays. Millis was scampering along beside him, and Braun, the runner, and two others; and he winked at them solemnly.
Emerging from the cut, he paused. The ruined granary, or warehouse or whatever it was supposed to be, was nowhere in sight. They’d been put ashore too far east. Up ahead he could see Lieutenant Feltner and two other men lying prone in a manzanita thicket at the top of a dune; their fatigues were slick and black with sea water. While he watched, Feltner gave the hand signal for take cover, and one of the others rolled over on his back and gingerly raised his rifle above his head with both hands. Enemy in sight. Damon frowned. Too bad. Well, it was probably to be expected. He remembered old Joe Stilwell at Benning, the lean, ascetic face, tart and professorial, the shrewd little eyes behind the steelrimmed spectacles: “Strategical surprise in an opposed landing, gentlemen, is extremely difficult to accomplish, as air and surface scouting can be carried out a long distance to seaward, and may very well result in the premature discovery of an approaching expeditionary force. Tactical surprise, however—as regards the commencement of operations against a particular beach on a particular time—is often possible. And every effort—repeat, every effort, gentlemen—should be made to effect it.”
Now they’d lost it. Well, at least they might be able to siphon off some of Atkins’ people opposing the main landing.
But the curious thing was there was still no firing.
He worked his way up to the top of the dune, dropped down beside Feltner, pulled out his map, wiped his field glasses against his shirt and peered through the tortured black stems of the manzanita. Yes, there were the railroad tracks, the eucalyptus grove, the two buildings marked on the map, the broken wall, and just beyond the tracks the old road from Seaside. He could see no movement—he was about to turn impatiently to Feltner when a man stepped out of the shadows of the grove, an officer, raised a cigarette to his lips. For a moment he peered west, toward the main landing, where small-arms fire now crackled briskly; then he turned and Damon saw the wide red band on his left arm. Behind him, half-hidden in a clump of scrub oak, stood a motorcycle and sidecar; the flag orderly squatted beside it, waiting. He sighed with relief.
“Umpire,” he said to Feltner, who peered through his own glasses with a harried, drawn expression.
“Oh yes. I’m sorry, Major. I didn’t see it—I just saw him moving. Jackson here spotted him.”
“That’s all right. Better to be safe than ruled out.” He turned to Jackson. “See anybody else, Hawkeye?”
The Kentucky boy studied the buildings, the grove, the rise beyond it. Damon followed his glance, saw it pause on a ground squirrel, move on again. “Nary a soul,” he murmured. “Except for the feller with the scooter.”
“Good.” Damon got to his feet. “We’re wasting time. Let’s go on down there.” Turning to Sergeant Bowcher he said: “Wave them all on up, on the double.”
“Yes, sir.”
He hurried down the slope to the clump of deserted buildings. The eucalyptus trees smelled of smoke and urine and beeswax, an alien but not unpleasant odor. As the men came up he deployed them. He had two squads fill the breaks in the old wall with dead brush and placed the BAR teams there, set up his machine guns in the bushes on each flank, and sent out scouts in both directions along the edge of the road. The umpire, a lieutenant colonel with a tired, lined face and a taffy-colored mustache, watched him silently. He nodded once, went on giving orders.
“Now if anything comes along that road I don’t want any firing or rebel-yelling or anything else,” he told Bowcher and Starker and several other NCOs. “No one will fire except on command. Pass the word.—Where’s De Luca?”
“Right here, Major.”
“Get on that box of yours, Dee. Get me HATCHET. Quick as you can.” The boy bent over the black bulk of the portable radio, fiddling with it. There was no sound. “What’s the matter?”
“Can’t get them. Can’t get anything …” De Luca looked up angrily. “It got wet when we came in. These lousy 131s, I tell you, Major—”
“All right,” Damon cut him off. “Keep at it. —Braun!”
“Yes, sir.”
“Get back to the main landing. Your best bet is double back to the beach. Find Colonel Wilhelm or Colonel Westerfeldt and tell them I have reached the old Seaside Road unopposed and am dug in, interdicting all White movement. I am also in a position to exploit the left flank of Del Monte Heights through Torre Canyon and Hill 83.”
“Yes, sir.” Braun turned to go.
“Wait a minute. Repeat that back.”
Braun stared at him. He was a quick, eager boy, with a good eye and fine stamina, but he was shivering from the Pacific and visibly nervous. “What, sir?”
“I said: repeat back to me what I’ve just told you.”
Braun got the first part right, the second part wrong. The usual pattern.
“No,” Damon said patiently. “I’ll say it once more and then I want you to give it back exactly.” He repeated the message while Braun hung on his words, his mouth open. This time the boy got it right and Damon smiled.
“That’s the pitch. Take off, now. Speed is important.”
He made some other dispositions. The radio sputtered and roared for a moment, then went out again, while De Luca cursed at it. He studied the map with Feltner and Captain Booth. The sound of firing drifted up to them from the main landing, punctuated with the thump of artillery from the White forces. It was going to take too long. Far too long, with a runner. It was a difficult decision. He could leave a token force here—a machine-gun squad, say—and push on inland; he could bend south and west to hook up with the regiment; he could stay where he was. Part of him wanted to push off for Del Monte; but if the Whites were to take it into their heads to come up that road in force …
The umpire was gazing at him—a steady, piercing gaze that held just the faintest suspicion of a smile at the corners of his mouth. He felt a rush of irritation, thrust it aside. He looked at his watch. Nine twenty. Was that all? They’d hardly got ashore. No: it would jeopardize too much to leave the road lightly held. The beachhead had to take priority. It was a great chance, a tremendous chance; but he would have to pass it up. The umpire had opened his notebook and was making some notations, biting on his mustache. Damon wondered what he was writing, then forgot about it, looking around. All eyes were o
n him. One word from him—one word!—and this supine, cleverly concealed configuration would leap to its feet and dispose itself in columns, in ranks, in skirmish lines … He sighed. The sun felt warm in the grove. This would be a lovely spot to live if it was this sunny and warm in January. A place to retire, maybe; when the hurly-burly’s done, when the battle’s lost and—
He started. Jackson, on the slope to his right, was pumping his rifle frantically up and down. He signaled back. “All right,” he said, his voice loud in the quiet. “Enemy in force, coming up the road. You will fire only on command.”
Horses. Cavalry, coming up the road at a fast trot. A full troop. He ran his eyes over his command: they were perfectly quiet, staring ahead over their weapons. A maneuver, an exercise, but there was nevertheless a faint swelling in the throat, that old, thick pulsing of the blood. Rodriguez at the machine gun near him was grinning, his eyes slitted. Damon wondered where he’d seen that look before, couldn’t remember. He watched the troop approaching, bobbing along. Damn fools. Walking right into it. He waited until they were within a hundred yards or so and said crisply:
“Open fire.”
The sudden uproar of blanks was deafening. The lead riders reined up, milling; then one of them raised his pistol and all at once they were charging, coming straight down the lane of disintegrating macadam and weeds. Damon heard himself exclaim: “For Christ sake—” The machine guns clattered away, the loaders feeding the belts smoothly. The cavalry was rushing nearer, as if borne on the cool wind—fifty yards, thirty, at full gallop, a fearsome onslaught: they looked enormous, full of might; the pistols winked brightly here and there against their mass. Two men jumped up from their places by the wall. “Halsman! Brien!” he roared at them, “—get down!”
And then they were on them—a thundering, howling legion. Damon had one last glimpse of the flag orderly wildly waving a huge white flag and Rodriguez still grinning, intent, rocking the gun’s muzzle upward—and then men and horses were everywhere, leaping over the wall, wheeling and dancing, spraying sand in their faces. Damon jumped up, shouting angrily, heard a whistle shrill in sharp bursts: three, four times. The umpire was standing upright in his sidecar, pointing at several horsemen.