by James Jones
“Halt!” the bigger one said again. With four eyes and two pistol holes the two of them looked him over cautiously.
“Its all right, Harry,” said the bigger one, a little more confidently. “He’s a GI.”
Well, at least there was that, anyway.
The man standing up staring at him over the Thompson gun sat back down, and there was an unheard sound of a great relaxing, like a vast sigh of relief.
“Douse that spot,” called the bigger one. In the dimmer light the two of them came up to him.
“What the hell you doin out here, Mack?” said the bigger one indignantly. He was a S/Sgt. The other was a Cpl. “You like to scared the livin shit out of us. We get a call from Position Sixteen somebody movin aroun out on the golf course and we think we got a whole battalion of parachutists in our lap.”
He understood it then. Somebody had seen his silhouette against the blue headlights of the patrol car he had stood in the golf course and watched. Somebody from G Company. But you’d think a goddam man who claimed to be such a hotshot Infantry soldier would have remembered that.
“I’m going back to my position,” he said.
“Yeah. What position.”
“Number Eighteen. Down the road.”
“Eighteen, hunh. What outfit.”
“G Company, —th Infantry.”
The S/Sgt relaxed a little bit more. “Dont G Company —th Infantry know theres a goddam curfew on?”
“Yes.”
“Then what the hell you doin off your position?”
“I’m just goin home from seein my wahine. She lives right over there,” he nodded across the golf course.
“You got a pass?”
“No.”
“No pass,” said the other one with finality. “Come on, lets take him in and get it over with.” He was being tough. He had relaxed some too now. He had been bad scared and now he was being tough. He had put his pistol back in the holster.
“Just hold your horses, Corprl Oliver,” said the S/Sgt.
“Its immaterial to me,” said the Cpl.
“Who’s in charge of Position Eighteen, friend?” said the S/Sgt.
“S/Sgt Choate.”
The two MPs looked at each other.
“You know who’s in charge of Eighteen, Harry?” the S/Sgt called back to the jeep.
In the jeep there was a consultation. “No,” Harry said. “But we can sures hell find out in a minute.”
“Okay,” said the S/Sgt. “Lets run him down there.”
“Its immaterial to me,” said the Cpl. “But I say take him down to the Station. I dont like his looks, Fred. Look at that uniform. Its garrison, and starched neat as a pin. Whats he doin in a garrison uniform? There aint no barricksbag press on that uniform. That uniform aint seen the inside of a barricksbag since it was last to the cleaners.”
“It wont hurt to run him down there,” said the S/Sgt.
“Its immaterial to me,” the Cpl said. “But it might hurt a lot. If he taken off on us.”
“How the hell is he goin to taken off on four of us, for Chrisake?”
“What if he just happen to of stole that nice clean uniform?” said the Cpl. “He might be a sabatoor. And his buddies waitin down the road to cut us down. Its immaterial to me. But how do we know he tint a spy or something?”
“How about that, friend?” said the S/Sgt. “You got buddies waitin down the road to cut us down?”
“I aint no spy, for Christ’s sake. Do I look like a spy?” That was one he had not anticipated. To be taken in for a possible spy. That would really be good.
“But how the hell we know you aint a spy?” said the Cpl. “Its immaterial to me.”
“Thats right,” said the S/Sgt. “You might be Tojo for all we know.”
“Maybe he’s gettin ready to blow up the Governor’s Mansion,” said the Cpl. “Or something. Its immaterial to me. But I say take him down to the Station. Then it aint our responsibility.”
“Ah, he aint no spy,” said the S/Sgt disgustedly. He had not put his pistol away, but it was hanging down at arm’s length by his side. “You got any identification on you, Mack? So we could tell who you are?”
“No.”
“Aint you got nothing?”
“No?”
“Then I’m afraid we’ll have to taken you in, friend,” the S/Sgt said. “You ought to have some kind of identification. I hate to do it. But then we just cant let every son of a bitch and his brother go runnin around all over at night without no identification like they was generals, either.”
Well, it was what he had expected. It had only been a shot in the dark anyway. But the S/Sgt was a pretty good joe and had come so near there for a minute. He made a try.
“Wait a minute. Listen you guys. You guys know I aint no spy. I been in this man’s Army six years. And plan to stay in twenty-four more. But you know what the Provost will do if you taken me in. He have me in the Stockade sure as you’re born. Theres a goddam war on and the whole Army needs ever man it can lay hands on. It wont do the war no good to send me to the Stockade. And I been waitin six years for this war. Please, give me a break.”
“You shoulda thoughta all that before you taken off,” said the Cpl.
“If there was any chance of me bein a spy, it would be differnt. But you guys know I aint no spy or nothing like that.”
“You knew what the orders was,” said the Cpl. “You knew there was a curfew. So you taken off to see your shackjob. Okay. You knew what you’d get if you got caught.
“Besides, how we suppose to know who you are. Its immaterial to me. But you could say you’re anything. Everbody knows G Company of the —th is all down along here.”
“Shut up, Oliver,” said the S/Sgt. “Who’s in charge of this detail, me or you? That what you said about the Stockade,” he said. “Thats true as Christ’s cross. There aint no sense in throwin a man in there where he’s useless when there’s a war on for some little thing like this here. Its a waste of valuble manpower. Its stupid.”
“Of course its stupid!”
“But at the same time, I got to be sure. Aint you got no kind of identification on you, Mack? If you just had some kind of identification on you. So we could be sure. Any old thing, that would identify you.”
“No,” he lied, “not a thing,” fingering with his left hand in his pocket among the cartridges the old, green, frayed, SP Card. The used-to-be passport. The once-was visa. Back into the promised land, that everybody always acted like was the desert and made like they wanted to get out of. The last year’s membership card. That would not get you into the Clubroom this year why the hell dint you remember to keep up your dues this card and five cents will get you a good nickel cigar. And that, because everybody who was not over the hill had had to turn their’s in a month ago, was now not only useless, but actively dangerous, to show. There was a good one for you. There was the best one yet. The Warden would really love that one.
“Then we’ll just have to take you in,” the S/Sgt said.
He tried one more time.
“You could take me down to Position Eighteen? and let them identify me?”
“Yeh, I could do that,” the S/Sgt said.
“I swear to you they know me there,” he swore to them. Because he would settle for that. He hadnt wanted to. But he would. Gladly. He wasnt proud. What difference did it make? if Chief Choate sent him on down to the CP after he’d lied the MPs off? or if he went there under his own power? What did he care?
“You aint got the right to take the chance, Fred,” said the Cpl. “Its immaterial to me. But this guy.”
“He’s right there,” Fred said. “My job is to not take no chances whatever. If you aint got no identification, I’m afraid we’ll have to take you down.”
“Well for Christ’s sake do something,” Harry called indifferently from the jeep. “Time’s a wastin.”
“You shut up,” Fred the S/Sgt hollered. “Its my job, I got to answer for it. Not you.
“I’m afraid we’ll have to take you down, Mack,” he said reluctantly. He raised his pistol that was still hanging at arm length and made a half-hearted shooing motion toward the jeep.
“Dont you know I aint a spy?”
“Sure. I know it. But.”
“And take your goddam hands out of your pockets,” said the Cpl disgustedly. “Its immaterial to me. But how the hell long you been in the Army, friend? to keep your hands in your pockets?”
“Lets go, Mack,” said the S/Sgt.
Well, then that was the way it was then. Okay. Then so be it. He could still work back up and around them. There was only four. And sneak past across the Highway. They wouldnt look for him on the other side of the Highway. And work on east from there. So thats whats the matter. They werent going to take this one back. They’d never take this one back.
“Come on, Mack,” the S/Sgt said, still shooing half-heartedly. “Lets go.”
He let the mind, which at a great cost in Kentucky pride had been kept loose and open with the mineral oil of belief, constipate itself and close down into the old, narrow, clear, hard, crystal something which was the trademark of Harlan Kentucky and which was the only gift his father had ever given him in his whole life, and even that unwittingly, or he would probly tried to take it back.
“I said take your goddam hands out of your pockets,” the Cpl said disgustedly.
He jerked his hands out of his pockets, Alma’s Police .38 in the right one, and with the left one snatched the S/Sgt’s still shooing pistol and threw it sailing heavily across on the other side of the road, and with the right one bent the barrel of the .38 over the jaw of the helmeted Cpl.
And Prewitt, feeling airishly free in the arms and legs, without ropes, without handcuffs, without shackles, free to breathe too, without a strait jacket, feeling so free all over he was almost able to believe he was free, was running freely and without restriction into the night, into the levelness, into the darkness, of the Territory of Hawaii’s Waialae Golf Course. Treelessness, sand hills, scrubgrass, and all. There was a big sandtrap right around here someplace.
Running hard, sprinting, he flashed a look back over his shoulder and saw the two of them still there in the blue light of the headlights. They never should have done that, his mind registered automatically, they should have headed for the darkness first thing, he could shoot them both, even with this gun he did not know.
Then, in the middle of the split flash of the glance, he realized they did not know yet he had a gun, and were therefore not technically guilty of a mistake. At least not a reckless mistake. That made his sense of propriety feel a little less offended. Mistakes in knowledge were at least excusable. But a good soldier should never make a reckless mistake.
Fred the S/Sgt was yelling. “Back down to the corner. Theres a field phone station there.” The Cpl, his left hand holding his jaw, was just coming up shakily off his knees and there was the big red merry wink of his .45, before he was even clear up yet.
Prewitt quit looking and stopped sprinting and started the skirmisher’s zigzag, wanting to grin. They would measure up all right. Except for that one mistake of not getting out of the light, they were doing fine. And doing it fast. Where the hell was that sandtrap?
“All the men they got available,” Fred the S/Sgt was still yelling. “And alert all the beach positions. This guy wasnt no soldier.” The motor of the jeep roared. “No, not now, you fool!” Fred the S/Sgt yelled. “The light, first! The spot. Turn on the spot.”
Off to his left not far Prew saw the sandtrap.
Then the spotlight went on.
He stopped and turned around facing them.
Almost simultaneously, from the rider’s seat of the jeep, Harry’s Thompson gun batted its one big eye in a series of winks that had all the false coy merriness of a bloodshot one-eyed bar pickup.
Prewitt was standing facing them, almost on the lip of his sandtrap.
Maybe it was what Fred the S/Sgt yelled about alerting the beach positions. He had the Infantryman’s abhorrence of being shot at by his own outfit. Or maybe it was that about getting out every man available. There was still yet the causeway over the salt marsh and he saw in his mind the blue-lighted jeeps crowding on it waiting, till it looked like a rich man’s Christmas Tree in the front yard and he had been running from them a long time now he was out of breath now. Or perhaps it might have been because he felt such a strong affection for them suddenly the way they were handling it, almost proud of them, a confidence in them, they were really handling it well, it was a sound competent piece of work. He could not have done better himself. They were competent. Or, maybe it was just, simply, that last thing the S/Sgt had yelled: “This guy wasnt no soldier.”
Perhaps it was only a mechanical thing caused by the going on of the spotlight, the instinctive move of the Kentuckian who, unlike the Infantryman, is used to being shot at by friends, but has an almost religious abhorrence of being shot in the back.
Anyway, he knew Harry’s Thompson gun was winking at him, as he turned around.
Standing there, in that couple of seconds, he could have fired twice with the .38 and killed two of them, Fred and the Cpl, standing there in the light of the headlights, they were perfect targets, but he did not shoot. He did not even want to shoot. He hardly even thought about shooting. They were the Army, too. And how could a man kill a soldier for just simply doing a sound competent job? It was still the rottenest word in the language. He had killed once. It did not do any good. Even though it was justified, and he did not regret it, it still did not do any good. Maybe it never did any good. The other still went right on. And if he could not kill the other, he would kill nothing. You could kill and kill and kill. He would not become a Disciple of the Word. And these were the Army, too. It was not true that all men killed the things they loved. What was true was that all things killed the men who loved them. Which, after all, was as it should be.
Three somethings rent their way agonizingly through his chest in echelon and he fell over backwards into the sandtrap and Harry’s Thompson gun ceased its short burst that had been going on for what seemed such a long time.
Well, I learned it, Jack. I learned it. The sandtrap was deep and the slope was steep and he had fallen on a downhill lie and had bounced over onto his face in the sand of the bottom. His chest hurt numbly, but it was not especially uncomfortable. But he could hear them coming up, and he did not want them to see him like this. Not facedown in the sand. His legs would not work, but using his elbows a little he managed to roll himself over downhillwards onto his back and to pull himself on down out onto the sand where it was level. Then he was done. Well, Jack, I learned it.
He would look better this way. And he could look up at them. I bet you never thought I’d learn it, did you, Jack?
“He just stopped,” Harry’s voice was saying, still shocked, as they came on up. “He just stopped. I wasnt firing at nothing special. I was just firing. Then the light went on. And he just stopped.”
He was glad he had been able to roll himself over and get down level onto the sand. And so this was it, this was the one. He remembered his mother lying on the cot. Well, you got something to shoot at there, kid. You always wondered just how it would come. You always thought it would somehow be special. What you couldnt imagine was how it would have this just everyday quality. Like taking a crap. Or getting your socks off. Or rolling a smoke. Just common, ordinary, every day. You sweated and sweated it out, and waited and waited on it, all your life you waited on it, and then finally it came, and all the time you had hoped you would be able to do it well, and then it came, and there it was, and now you would see if you would do it well. You did not guess it would be everyday, though. It would have been a lot easier to do well if it had been special. He felt glad when he saw their heads come over the rim of the sandtrap and watched them sliding down the slope. It would be a lot easier to do it well when you had an audience.
“Jesus,” the Cpl said. “Those Thompsons su
re mess them up.”
“You know I didnt mean to shoot him,” Harry said. “He just stopped. It makes you feel pretty shitty.”
Thats what they call passive resistance, soldier. Aint that right, Jack? He was sliding down a long skislide of long snow, like. And he could feel himself beginning to go clear out of himself. And the cord he had seen that time in the Stockade that looked like it was made of come kept stretching and stretching as he coasted. Then he slowed and stopped coasting, delicately like, as if something hadnt quite made up its mind yet, and then began to come back in a little. So this was the way it was, hunh. Who would of guessed it was like this. He was glad he had been able to get off his face in the sand.
“Is he dead yet?” the Cpl said.
“Not yet,” Fred said.
“Look,” the Cpl said. “He had a gun. In the sand there. He didnt fire it?”
“He just stopped,” Harry said.
“You want me to take a look now?” the Cpl said.
“Wait a while,” Fred said.
That Fred. He was a good boy. He understood. It was like the having them find you with your face in the sand. He wanted to say something, to do something, something good, a joke maybe, that would show them how well he was going to do it. But when he tried to speak he found he couldnt. Cant even speak. Cant move now either. Can just lay and look at them. No audience after all. Well, it wont be so long. It’ll just be for a little while.
He wished he’d got a chance to read the rest of those books. And he hated to see the ones he had read be wasted. Somehow he had felt they would be used. The worst was to think how it would all go right on afterwards. Alma. And Warden. Maggio, somewhere. All go right on. He was selfish. He did not want it all to go right on.