by James Jones
Alma had a .38 Police Special Smith & Wesson which one of the local cops had given her for a present that she kept loaded in a drawer of the desk along with a box of cartridges, and he took it.
Whatever else, he did not intend to ever go back to no Stockade no more. Go back to the old Stockade, with Angelo and The Malloy and Blues and the rest of them all there like they had been before—yes. But he was not going back to any new Stockade, where they were all gone and there was doubtless a new Fatso Judson, and everything else was changed, except perhaps Major Thompson.
He removed the old cartridges that had probably been in it for years and reloaded it with new ones from the box and put some more of them in his pocket. Then he helped himself to the money that Alma also kept in the desk, and walked down the hill to Kaimuki and caught a Beretania streetcar to town to pay a visit to Rose and Charlie Chan at the Blue Chancre.
It was wonderful to be outdoors again in sunlight and air. His side was still a little stiff but it did not hurt him to walk. He had to wear a jacket because of the .38 Special stuck in his belt, but it was light tropical worsted (Alma and Georgette had bought it along with the slacks and dressing gown) and it had saddle-stitched lapels and he did not mind it even in the sun because he felt very ritzy in it.
He got off the bus a couple blocks up and sauntered down past the alleyway that ran back to the Log Cabin Bar & Grill. It looked just the same as it always had.
There was nobody in the Blue Chancre when he went in. A few sailors drinking beer and trying to make time with Rose who was strictly an Army girl. But nobody from the Company. He sat at the bar and drank whiskey-sodas, so he would not get drunk enough to get noticed and get picked up, and talked to Charlie.
G Company was all out at Makapuu Head building pillboxes, Charlie told him, that was why there was nobody there. Hadnt been nobody here since before the maneuvers started. Place velly dead.
Rose came over and sat down by him after a while and asked grinningly how he liked being a civilian now? It scared him at first, or rather startled him, but he told himself he should of known they would know it, and they both laughed and seemed to think it was big joke and wanted to know how long he planned stay vacation? Nobody mentioned Fatso Judson. He sat and talked to them about the free life of a civilian quite a while.
He did not know just exactly what he had expected. He had expected to find some of the Company there, for one thing. He did not know about the beach positions. He knew it was reckless to show up down there, but he did not expect anyone from the Company would turn him in, unless it would be Ike Galovitch. And Old Ike never went to the Blue Chancre.
He found out from Rose that Old Ike had been busted. It must have happened the day after he left, he figured. And Rose told him about how Warden was up for a commission which, if he had heard it during the nine days he waited for Fatso, had failed to register. The new Company Commander, Rose said, maybe turning out not be such bad joe after all, look like.
The more they talked the more homesick he got. He had to watch himself carefully not to get drunk. He bet they were having a rough time out at Makapuu, building pillboxes in that rock. But the roughness, strangely, instead of making him glad he was out of it, excited him and made him want to get in on it.
He stayed until 9:30 or 10:00 o’clock, eating Charlie’s hamburgers cooked out back that were at least one-third cereal, with plenty of onion and mustard, to keep the liquor from getting into him, and telling himself it was the best food he had had in weeks.
There were plenty sailors at the six booths and four tables, but almost no soldiers. Hardly any soldier coming town now any more, Charlie said. Rose’s latest shackjob, a S/Sgt of Field Artillery, came in; and Rose, with her Chinese eyes and Portagoose nose and mouth and the startling eye-arrestingly beautiful waggling waggling take-a-hold-of-me bottom that seemed to be distinctively peculiar to Portagoose-Chinese girls also, left Prew at the counter and spent her time between beer calls in a booth with the S/Sgt.
Charlie could not talking about anything but how this pillbox job luin the blisness, not like old maneuvels use to be, be plenty glad when him oveh.
It was just before he left that Rose happened to remember how The Warden had been in asking for him, just before maneuvers, the very night before, in fact. She thought it was big joke.
What he want them tell The Warden? if he come back? They both wanted to know.
“Tell him I been here,” he said immediately. “Tell him I miss him, I cant hardly stay away from his beautiful face. Tell him I’m lookin for him, too,” he added, “and if he wants to see me, this is the best place to look.”
They both nodded. They did not look surprised. They were used to screwball soldiers. Him Army. Awys think screwy, Army guys.
He got home around twelve. He had ridden the streetcar again, going home, instead of a taxi. Maybe it was because he felt more like a free man, sitting in the streetcar with all those people, people who could come and go when they pleased without feeling funny every time they passed a cop on a corner. He put the pistol away in the desk drawer, and put the rest of the shells back in the box. He was already in bed asleep when Georgette and Alma got home at two-thirty.
Chapter 49
IT WAS WHAT ROSE told him about The Warden that made him go back. He knew it was reckless. Once, just for gossip, that was all right. But any more than once was pushing your luck. He went back anyway.
In all, he went back five times, before he finally ran into Warden. Each time he took the pistol and extra cartridges out of the drawer to take with him, and each time he put them back when he got home. Georgette and Alma did not even know he had been out of the house at all. They noticed he seemed to be in a much better humor lately; but they did not know why.
He was careful to spread the trips out over a period. Somehow, he had a hunch Warden could fix it. If Warden was anything, he was a fixer. So he kept going back doggedly, but to go back two days in a row was pushing your luck too much for even his doggedness.
The first three times he drew a blank because the Company was still out at Makapuu building pillboxes. Charlie was adamant. Charlie was beginning to think this job never get done. Even Rose, when she was not sitting with her S/Sgt of Field Artillery, was worried.
The fourth time he went back was the night of November 28th, the day they got back in from the field, and he ran into a whole bunch of them—tanned, horny handed, cracked nailed, freshly shaved, tough—Chief Choate (a S/Sgt now), Andy and Friday, Sgt Lindsay, Corp Miller, Pete Karelsen, Malleaux the supply sergeant, Scholar Rhodes, Bull Nair, and a bunch of the new draftees. It was funny how quick the draftees in the Company had fallen into the scheme of things and picked up the Blue Chancre as their hangout. They all looked good, even the draftees. The old bunch were all glad to see him. They slapped him on the back as if he had just won the inter-Company track meet single-handed like a decathlon. Stark was not there. He had wanted to see Stark. He had a hard time to keep them from getting him drunk. Warden did not show, and he did not mention him.
But he took a chance and went right back the next night, in spite of the risk. He did not think any of them would turn him in. And somehow he had a hunch; he had more than a hunch, even though none of them had mentioned The Warden either. The same ones were not all there, but the ones who werent there when he arrived were either coming in or going out the rest of the evening, either on their way to or on their way from Mrs Kipfer’s or the Service Rooms or the Ritz Rooms or some of the others, because this was an occasion, this was the feast after the six weeks of fasting out in the desert. The Warden was not mentioned this time either.
While he drank beer and watched the door, Prew tried not to think how some of them were either going to or coming from the Ritz where they might have just been in the bed with Georgette. But his hands got sweaty anyway.
He saw Warden, it seemed, almost before he came in sight around the pushed-back latticework of the open front. Warden did not come in. He did not even look in. He sauntered on
past and disappeared beyond the other side of the open front. Apparently nobody else in the place saw him at all. Prew waited a couple of minutes and finished his beer, before he went out.
Warden was leaning against the wall at the corner of the alley smoking.
“Well, I’ll be dammed!” he said. “Look who’s turned up.”
“Bad pennies,” Prew said.
“I thought you’d be back in the States by now,” Warden said.
“Did you see Rose?”
“This afternoon. I figured you couldn’t stay away forever.”
“Listen,” Prew said. “Whats the deal?”
“Lets go across the street,” Warden grinned. “This is no place to talk unless everybody’s got a pass in their pocket.”
“I’ve got my SP Card.”
“They’ve been revoked since the day maneuvers started,” Warden said. “And I dont want my draftee chicks to see the 1st/Sgt consorting with awols. They dont understand the Army yet.”
He led the way across the street to another identical bar that was identically crowded with other men from another identical company except that this company was from the 8th Field. They ordered whiskey and Warden paid for it.
“Why the hell didnt you come back after maneuvers started?” Warden said disgustedly. “I had it fixed then.”
“I couldn’t. I was gettin over a cut in my side. Whats the deal about Fatso? Have they got me down for Fatso or havent they?”
“Who’s Fatso?” Warden said.
“Fatso Judson,” Prew said. “You know who I mean. Fatso Judson. Come on, quit stalling.”
“Never heard of him,” Warden said.
“You’ve heard of him,” Prew said. “Do you mean they’ve never heard of him? What do you mean? Quit playing secret service agent. This is serious, to me.”
They were talking in low voices across the low table in the general hubbub of Artillerymen. Warden looked around him once before he spoke.
“I’ll lay it all out for you,” he said. “Then you can do what you want. But first, you better push that gun down in your belt or else lean over farther. That pistol butt shows through your coat plain as day.”
Prew leaned over quickly and looked around before he reached down to push it down.
“It’s not a good place to carry it,” he explained.
“Hell,” Warden said. “It stuck out so plain I could even name it for you. Its a .38 Colts Police Special.”
“Smith & Wesson.”
“Well,” Warden said, “I couldn’t see the hump on the handle.”
“Well, come on,” Prew said. “Whats the deal?”
“You’re loaded for bear, aint you?” Warden said.
“I aint going back to no Stockade, if thats what you mean. Come on, goddam it,” he said, “quit stalling. Whats the deal?”
“So you finally decided you want to come back after all,” Warden said.
“I aint going back to no Stockade.”
“You said that before.”
“And I’ll say it again.”
Warden signaled to the waitress for another round for them. “There dont nobody know anything about Fatso Judson. At least they dont connect you with it.”
“How do you know?”
“I dont know for sure,” Warden admitted. “But there hasnt been anybody around asking about you from the Provost Marshal’s office. If they connected you with it, they’d have been around. I’ll stake my reputation on that.”
“What reputation?” Prew said sarcastically, but already feeling a tenseness begin to relax inside of him.
“My reputation as a cocksman, you jerk,” Warden sneered.
“Then I can come back,” Prew said. “Boy. I’ll tell you something. I’ll never go coon hunting or possum hunting again in my life.”
“Theres more to it than that,” Warden said. “If you’d of come back the first two or three days after maneuvers started, I could of got you off with a couple weeks extra duty. But you’ve been gone six weeks since then. Even with a shithead like this Ross. I cant explain that away. You cant get off without at least a Summary Court.”
“I aint going back to the Stockade,” Prew said quickly. “Not even if I have to hide out on this Rock the rest of my life.”
“I’ll lay it out for you straight,” Warden said narrowly. “I could tell you you get off with a Summary Sentence of two weeks in the Regimental guardhouse, but I wont. If you get a Summary at all, you’re lucky. You’ve been gone six weeks on the records. If you get a Summary at all, you’re sure to get the limit.”
“One month in the Stockade,” Prew said.
“And two-thirds pay,” Warden nodded. “And you may even get a Special Court. You already got one offense against you. But if you get a Special, I think I can guarantee you wont get more than two months and two-thirds.”
“But I might get the full six.”
“No,” Warden said. “I can promise you wont get over two. I think I can get you off with a Summary.”
“Then I aint going back.”
“I dont know what you expect. My Christ, you’ve been gone weeks.”
“I dont know what I expect either. But I know I aint going back to that Stockade. Even for one month. And thats all she wrote.”
Warden straightened up in his chair. “Suit yourself. But thats the best I can get for you. Ross is mad because he thinks you took off on him just to get out of maneuvers.”
Prew was puzzled. “But what about all the time before that? I was gone a week before maneuvers started.”
“He dont know about that.”
“But how . . . ?”
“God damn it!” Warden said. “Baldy Dhom carried you present. I was on furlough and he was Acting First and he carried you present. He was still carrying you present when I got back. He had me by the balls and I either had to go back and pick you up retroactive, or else carry it.”
“But your furlough was up three days after I left.”
“Dont kid yourself,” Warden said viciously. “I wouldnt of done it for you. I wouldnt have carried you one single day. You were a fuckup when you got in this company and you’re still one and you’ll always be one. I dont know why the fuck I’m down here bothering to talk to you right now.”
“Because you’re ashamed of being an officer,” Prew grinned.
“I’ve never been ashamed of anything I ever did in my life,” Warden snorted. “Includin that. Shame aint a spontaneous emotion; shame is an induced emotion. A man who knows his own mind dont know what shame is.”
“What book did you read that in?”
“If I had any brains I never would have fucked off and come down here in the first place.”
Prew did not say anything. He did not try to uncover any more of the unexplained four days grace, and he did not try to bore any deeper into what was such an obvious lie. He would have felt ashamed if he did.
“I guess you think I’m ungrateful,” he said finally.
“Everybody’s ungrateful,” Warden snorted. “I’m even ungrateful to myself, for all the favors I do me.”
“A mans got to decide for himself what he has to do,” Prew said.
“Everybody decides for themself,” Warden said. “And always wrong.”
“You aint been in that Stockade. I saw them kill a man in that Stockade. They beat him to death.”
“He probly ask for it.”
“Whether he ask for it or not aint the point. Nobody’s got the right to do that to another human being.”
“Maybe not, but they do it,” Warden grinned. “All the time.”
“Matter of fact, the guy did ask for it,” Prew said. “But that still dont give them the right to do it to him. He happened to be a friend of mine. Fatso Judson was the man who was responsible for it.”
“Dont tell me your worries,” Warden said. “I got worries enough of my own. I told you what I could do for you, and thats the best I can do.”
“Can you see why I cant go back there any
more?”
“I cant see anything,” Warden said. “Can you see why I’d be an officer?”
“Sure,” Prew said. “I can see it. I’d like to be one myself sometimes. You’d make a good officer.”
“Then you can see more than I can,” Warden said viciously. “Lets get out of this firetrap.”
They pushed out through the surging mass and stopped outside to light cigarets. Across the street the Blue Chancre was lighted and yelling. The sidewalks were crowded with Men of Schofield. Letting down, letting way down, after six weeks to two months in the field.
They had to stand back against the building to keep from being carried along in the press. From the dark of River Street down at the end of the block to as far up the other way as they could see Beretania was blazing at them with neon and lighted display windows interspersed with the dark stairways of the whorehouses.
“It’s pretty,” Prew said. “I’ve always liked neon signs. I like to stand at one end of a street and look at them all strung out down along it. Theres fifty towns in this country that got prettier streets than Broadway. Memphis, Albuquerque, Miami, Colorado Springs, Cincinnati I like the crowds, too—except when I get in them.”
Warden didnt say anything.
“I wish I could go back,” Prew said. “I want to go back. But I cant do any more time, even to go back.”
“The only way you’ll ever go back without having to do time,” Warden said viciously, “is if the Japs or somebody bombs this fucking island and they let all the prisoners out to go fight.”
“You’re a big help,” Prew said.
“You can see what I think of your chances.”
“Yeah.”
“You’d better stay away from the Blue Chancre,” Warden said. “Or anywhere down in here. They’ve pulled in all the SP cards and Class As. And since maneuvers, they’ve been checking passes.”
“Thanks for the tip.”
“Keep the change.”
“Well,” Prew said, “so long.”
“So long,” said Warden.
The big man crossed the street to the Blue Chancre and Prewitt turned up Beretania toward town away from the river. Neither one of them tried to look back.