The Brick Foxhole

by Richard Brooks

  The soldier, Jeff knew, did not concern himself with such matters. To the fighting man in battle, war was an M-1 rifle, a Browning automatic rifle, a hand grenade, a flame thrower, a bangalore torpedo. And the soldier hoped for one thing: that his rifle would not jam at an inopportune moment.

  The fighting man was only casually acquainted with the terrain. Often he did not know where he was going until the last moment. He was prevented from reading certain essential information because it had been stamped secret. At home the civilians were reading the same information in newspapers and magazines. A soldier’s war in battle was between one of the enemy and himself. Keeley had made that clear to Jeff. Peter had often told Jeff that a soldier had a war on with only one of the enemy at a time. That was all. At home, the civilian moved platoons and companies and regiments and even armies.

  To the barracks-soldier the war was still another matter. War was getting to the property room to survey a pair of dirty sheets and a pillowcase. It was getting no mail. It was hating the stench of sweating bodies packed closely in side by side and overhead. It was sloshing through a filthy shower room whose drain was stopped up, where the clammy cold soap curds gathered around the ankles and old cigarettes floated around like rusty nails spewing faded shreds of tobacco. It was making effort to move your bowels, taking a seat in a row of ten seats and facing another row of ten seats and trying not to notice the other men or hear them or let them hear you. It was all of these things and none of them. To the barracks-soldier war was something created for his discomfort and inconvenience.

  And in thinking of these things, Jeff knew that being assigned to a war front would be a welcome change. He knew also that most of the men felt the same way. Such were the mental hazards of boredom and petty oppression that real war would have been a gift.

  The civilian looked at the barracks-soldier and thought one of several things. He was lucky not to be in a foxhole, lucky to have U.S.O.’s, lucky to be alive, lucky not to be paying taxes and looking for a place to live. The civilian imagined barracks life to be much like a sequence of comical events. Men played jokes on each other and laughed and played the guitar and had fun, and somehow, before things got too bad, there came an order from a grumpy but kindly colonel and the boy marched up a gangplank to the hearty brass mutterings of a huge band while his girl waved good-by from the pier.

  Jeff smiled as he walked through the barracks.

  He thought: “See here Corporal Mitchell, the trouble with you is that you’ve got no sense of humor. Don’t you know that this is all very funny? Don’t you know that you’re supposed to laugh at all this and be chummy with your friends and play tricks on everybody. You’re not living up to par, Corporal Mitchell. Look at these men leap out of bed full of pep and go-at-’em. Why, you know, damn well, Corporal Mitchell that these men hate each other’s guts. That if a guy pulled any silly tricks they’d knife him and think nothing of it. That if you leave your locker open for a minute your clothes will be stolen and it won’t be for fun. That you’ve always got to check the dice to see they’re not loaded and look closely at the cards to see they’re not marked. That you’ve got to spread out a piece of paper on the toilet seat to keep from getting crabs. See here, Corporal Mitchell, you know you’re making all this up and you’re living a life of ease and comfort and safety.”

  He kept smiling as he watched the men get out of their beds. Their eyes were heavy, their faces bloated with sleep.

  The floor was littered with cigarette butts and funny papers and countless comic-strip magazines. And the men scratched themselves and it didn’t appear funny. Their skivvies stank with the sweat of sleep and that didn’t smell comical. Their feet and ankles were dirty and unwashed and that didn’t make you want to laugh. The men belched and farted and somehow that didn’t seem humorous. The men were sullen and their anger lay close to the surface. And Jeff knew that the reason these men had no feeling of friendship for one another was because they had nothing in common except their misery. They hadn’t fought against a common enemy. They hadn’t watched each other die. They hadn’t saved one another’s lives. They hadn’t seen and hated and connived against and cursed a figure that was the enemy. These men had not yet been to war. Therefore they had nothing in common. Two men in a foxhole with their lives at stake grew to depend on each other and love each other. Two men in the barracks had enough time and freedom to hate each other, and there was nothing at stake but their own individual comfort.

  The civilian somehow would never know this, Jeff thought.

  To a civilian, the soldier is either a drunken bull rolling down the street with rape in his heart, or some bleeding hero in a foreign land, a medal-wearing figure who is tearing a hated enemy with a saw-toothed bayonet. Or he is a man lying in some ditch, like those advertisements in the magazines, with a sorrowful look in his eyes which tells the folks at home to keep the drugstore exactly as he left it because he’s coming back.

  To a soldier, the civilian was some lucky person who knew the real meaning of freedom, had a bathroom with a door on it, and knew the utter glory of not standing in line for everything from chow to chits.

  To a civilian, war was a bombing plane, its belly loaded with hell and its glorious wings a tornado of burning steel. And death was pure and quick and worthy of headlines. War was a colorful, bruising tank crushing trees and spanning desert wastes and always arriving in time to smash all enemy resistance. It was a periscope of a submarine sighting on the enemy, and always there were mysterious words such as: “Ready. Aim. Fire. Torpedo Number Four. Crash Dive. This one is for Willie.” War was thrilling: it was narrow escape, and reporters writing wonderful words, and photographers taking pictures, and the pictures appearing in Life and Look, and the President hanging a decoration around your neck while your mother weeps softly in the background. War was exotic women in foreign bistros who gave the soldier all their charms and then dropped a few tears on his cheek for saving them from a fate worse than rape! War was spy plots and cars careening around corners and the enemy always outwitted; it was modesty and clean nurses in white hospitals.

  To the soldier, war was boring and fighting was seldom. It was endless marching in more preparation for more marching. It was looking at your own aircraft thundering over your head and whispering: “Fly you bastard. Fly! You’re free, damn it. Fly away and never come back. Fly, fly. Get out of the muck and dirt. Fly!”

  Jeff was a barracks-soldier and he saw the war as.…

  Full of stink …

  And filth …

  And privation …

  And lack of sleep …

  And lack of dignity …

  And lack of love …

  And lack of rest …

  And lack of freedom …

  And lack of tenderness …

  And lack of loyalty …

  And lack of body and soul …

  And lack of imagination …

  And lack of ambition …

  And lack of the feel of money in your pants pocket …

  And lack, lack, lack.

  War was the lack of everything for which you were supposed to be fighting.

  Jeff opened his trunk and put the bottle of atabrine in his pocket. Then he opened his locker door and took out his shaving kit. He read the inscription on it. “Beard or not I love you, Mary.” She had given him that before they were married, when he had complained that he hated to shave. He wondered if she stood at the bathroom door of their house and watched Red shave in the morning. Red what? What the hell was his last name now? He had forgotten. It didn’t matter. As a matter of fact he didn’t care whether Red shaved or not. With the daylight he felt stronger.

  With his shaving kit he went into the hallway where the men were waiting for roll call. The Duty N.C.O. said: “Fall in.”

  The men made some sort of wavery formation and stood half at ease and half at attention. The Duty N.C.O. read off the names. “Aarons, Albert, Ashley, Barker.…” Jeff’s mind went blank. It would take at least
three minutes before the M’s were reached. Finally his name was called and he answered, “Here.” Then he went blank again. Monty Crawford came out of his small room and stood there with bloodshot eyes. He looked meek in the morning, meeker than later in the day when his brain took command of his body. After he was through with the muster, the Duty N.C.O. said that Sergeant Crawford had something to say. Monty began by saying: “At ease.”

  The men slumped.

  “I been asked by Lieutenant Moore to talk to you. So that’s why I’m talking to you. I don’t like it any more than the rest of you. But I guess you deserve it or he wouldn’t of asked me to do it. The first thing is about military bearing. You ain’t got any. Now, I know you heard all this stuff before. But I guess it won’t hurt to hear it again. Specially you lunkheads from the animation department. You gotta remember that first of all you are all soldiers. First soldiers, then after that you are animation. Don’t ever forget that. This branch of the service is the best branch in the world. We’re different. Now the first thing is, you bums are not saluting the officers. Remember that. You got to salute the officers. How many you bums been through basic training? Come on. How many?”

  Most of the men raised their hands and felt foolish in doing so.

  “Okay,” said Monty, beginning to awaken. “They ought to make all you animation guys go through it again. You didn’t anything. You’re nothing but civilians, the whole damned bunch of you, and you’ll never be anything else. You don’t even try to act like real soldiers. All you’re wishing is for the war to end so you can all go home and get out of the service. Well, it ain’t over yet. It won’t be over for ten years maybe. And it’d be a good thing, too. Teach some of you what it’s all about. You can’t even salute an officer. You’re a disgrace to the service. In peacetime they’d kick your tail out of here. That’s what they’d do. So Lieutenant Moore says from now on every morning we will have close-order drill. Maybe that’ll teach you something. If they take my advice they’ll ship all you bums out to the Pacific and let the Japs kill you off.

  “There’s another thing. It’s about stealing. There’s been stealing again. You’re a disgrace. One of the men complains he lost a wristwatch his mother sent him. A waterproof wrist-watch. His mother sent it to him. None of you bastids probably got mothers. You got no respect for the service. You can always tell a man by how he doesn’t have respect for the service. A man don’t respect the service he don’t respect his mother. In peacetime a soldier could lay his wallet full of money on his bed and nobody would touch it. Sometimes I wonder what kinda homes you bums come from. And that brings me to another thing. You bums don’t even bathe or take a shower. I got complaints that you all stink something awful. It ain’t military. We got showers here and nobody uses ’em. Six showers. I’m gonna give you a little arithmetic. There’s how many you bums in these two squad rooms? A hundred and twenty in each, right? That’s two hundred and forty bums altogether. Okay. I been taking showers in the morning, in the afternoon, and sometimes I even take one at night. I never see nobody there taking a shower. How come? How come nobody’s there? Maybe one or two bums. That’s all. It ain’t military. You’ll get some kinda disease. One of you bums gets the crabs. Okay. That happens to anybody. But he don’t report it. Know what he could get for that? Thirty days in the guardhouse. That man’s a disgrace to the service. Another thing. Drinking. You know it’s against the rules for enlisted men they should bring liquor on the Post. Drunk is okay. You can get drunk. That’s your right. That’s a privilege you got in the service. But don’t leave any bottle around. That ain’t military.”

  Monty looked at a piece of paper handed to him by the Duty N.C.O.

  “Oh yes. Another thing. All you bums give blood to the Red Cross? Anybody didn’t?” Monty’s gaze roved over the men. “Anybody here ain’t bought a bond?” Again there was no reply. “Okay. Here’s the police detail for next week. Barnes, Collier, Dickey, Douglas.…” Monty finished reading the list. Then he walked off. The Duty N.C.O. said, “Attention.” The group came to attention. The Duty N.C.O. attempted to imitate Monty. “You lousy civilians,” he said, “you come to attention like a rotten banana.” He glared at the men and then said, “Dismissed.”

  The men broke ranks and started for the washroom to shave.

  Jeff was toward the rear, so he was lucky enough to obtain first use of a sink. He opened the bottle and swallowed an atabrine tablet. Then he soaped his face and started to shave. He was undecided for a moment whether or not to remove his shirt and necktie. He decided against it. He didn’t think about what Monty had said. None of the men thought about it. Lectures by Crawford went unheeded. A long time ago they had rankled Jeff, made him angry, shamed him. Now, he couldn’t even remember the text of them. He tried to hurry with his shaving. A small ragged line was beginning to form behind each shaver. That was something he had never gotten accustomed to. Waiting in line. You waited in line for everything. In basic training it was the same way. You waited in line to eat, to hand in your chow gear, to get mail, to get a clothes issue, to shave, to go to the latrine. Even to get bawled out. What had they told him during his first week of basic training? “If we get to know your name, look out. Don’t expect any kind of praise. If we don’t call your name out for anything, figure that’s praise.”

  Jeff finished shaving. He decided to splurge and throw away the blade. He always had the feeling that somehow the blade rusted between shaves. They said a blade was good for at least four shaves and maybe five. Who said? He didn’t know who said. Somebody. But actually a blade was not good for more than one shave. Not with a beard like Jeff’s. He started for his bunk to get a towel. Then he remembered somebody had stolen it. He wiped his face with toilet paper.

  The bugle blew bumps for chow. The line was formed outside. It always formed outside unless it rained or snowed. Then they formed in the basement and marched up the stairs and into the chow hall. That morning it was muggy but not raining. It would be a hot day. A very hot day.

  The mess sergeant came out and stood on the steps. Behind him stood the major, officer in charge of the mess that morning. The mess sergeant was a heavy man. His belly was big and protruding, and yet it wasn’t fat. He was one of those men with a hard, muscular, big belly. He had a thin nose and small ears. His barracks cap had an insignia that had turned green from salt water spray. He was proud of its saltiness. He had done two hitches in the service and he was proud of them. He was one of those who would do a thirty-year hitch and retire on a pension. He watched the men form below him with a sardonic smile on his thick lips. Finally they were in three ranks.

  “Fall in,” he barked.

  The men came to attention.

  “At ease,” he barked again.

  The men moved the right foot sidewise and slumped. They were at ease.

  “Now listen to me, you crumb-bums,” said the mess sergeant.

  It was going to be another lecture.

  The major behind the sergeant slumped, too. It was early in the morning for him. Twice a week he had to serve as mess officer. It meant rising at reveille, and reveille was at five-thirty. The major was hungry. He suddenly wished he were back in Cleveland in his job as manager of the restaurant.

  “Now I’m hearin’ that a lot of you crumb-bums is wastin’ a lot of chow,” crabbed the sergeant. “Maybe you stupids don’t know it but there’s a war on. There’s guys dyin’ all over the worl’. An’ they give their eyeteeth for a meal like you get here. I don’t understan’ it. Here you’re gettin’ free meals and you don’t pay nothin’ for your lodgin’s. An’ still it ain’t enough. You fill your bellies and waste food. You wanna know somethin’? You’ll start cuttin’ down on all this chow because some day you’ll be in a foxhole and you’ll wish you had a piece of bread. Yeah. Now some of you painters … you know who I mean … and all you photygraphic bunch … you think you’re salty. You been in the service for a coupla mont’s and you think you’re salty. Well, let me tell you you can drink brine three
times a day and you still won’t be salty. Now, you act like reg’lur soldiers or you won’t get no chow. Now, I’m gonna tell you crumb-bums somethin’. You’re gonna march inside this beautiful mess hall like genellmen. An’ you’re gonna sit down and I don’t wanna hear one peep, one grunt, one soun’ outta you. I want quiet. Okay, then. ’Ten—shun!”

  The men came to attention. The mess sergeant made a smart about-face and saluted the major. “Battalion mess is formed, sir,” he said. “Very well, sergeant, march the men in.” The sergeant made another about-face. “First two ranks … ri—ight face!” The first two ranks made a right face. “Third rank … left face!” The third rank made a left face. “March in!” The men marched in. They talked. They were noisy. They were loud. They had heard the mess sergeant but they hadn’t listened to a word he said.

  Some of the messmen were unclean. With one or two exceptions they were pimply-faced men with dirty hands and filthy aprons. Some of them had recently returned from battle zones, and had some affliction—either malaria or filariasis or wounds. Sent back to the States, they had been handed the glorious job of one month’s mess duty. All of them were dissatisfied. They hated the detail of carting away dishes, trays, plates, of cleaning tables, swabbing floors. This was their reward for having been wounded or incapacitated in action. And Jeff was ashamed because they had been overseas and were privates first class while he had not even faced the enemy and was a corporal. He felt guilty.

  At each table sat ten men. Five on each side of the table. The food was already on the table when they sat down. The eggs were cold and the coffee tepid. Butter was plentiful and everybody helped himself to it. Everyone ate cereal as though his life depended on it. The great American breakfast dish was a certain well-known brand. It was, Jeff often thought, as if every man in the service wanted to become a great athlete and believed the radio implicitly when it said that eating this cereal was the way to achieve this ambition. He could discover no other reason for eating all those bowlfuls of the stuff.