Danforth took the trench knife by the handle and drove it hilt deep into the earth between his legs. He stared at it and Billingsly and La Bung watched, eyes rooted on the American half-Indian’s sudden gesture. Then all together they heard the boisterous singing of Lau’rel and Niven as they approached from the dark of the brush. Danforth looked up. Billingsly and La Bung sighed almost in unison.
“A-roly, a-poly …” Lau’rel was singing.
“No. No. You got the goddamn words all wrong,” Niven was saying.
Something was wrong, Danforth knew now. There was in the night’s atmosphere a complete letdown of tenseness and fear. It covered the camp ghoulishly, worming its way into the once steady, ever alert pulsation of the unit. The abandonment of a constant tension always made him jumpy and uneasy. He had never been able to give himself to a detached state of mind. But how could they let down now? With the fires burning on the hill. With the Japs so close. And even if the Japs didn’t slice them to shreds there was always the jungle with its crocodiles and snakes and tarantulas.
“Roly Poly the war is holy
And not for little boy blues,
Drag yer nuts across my guts,
I’m one of the horny crewww.”
“We’re here old boy,” Lau’rel said. “We made it.”
“The Dus have a little too much laku,” La Bung smiled the right side of his mouth quivering.
“They’re plastered,” Danforth said.
“Niiice game,” came up Billingsly. “Ve got a couple a mullets. Niiice mullets for cards.”
“Billingsly!” Niven shouted. “My old frien’ Billingsly.”
They said hello all the way around. Lau’rel sat down. Niven unfolded next to him.
“What are you drowning your sorrows for, Pullmotor?” Danforth grinned. “Still upset because Con threw you out of the headquarters?”
“Up your’s, Sitting Bull,” Niven tilted his head drunkenly, a sarcastic curl on his lips.
“What do you say we get off it, chaps?” Lau’rel interjected. “If we are going to poker, let’s get on with it.”
“Niiice lettle game,” Billingsly said. “Table stakes, eh?”
“I’ll play for anything you play for, Sitting Bull,” Niven said.
“The blues are von rupee, the reds fife, the vites ten rupees,” Billingsly sighed gustily. He gave them each a stack of chips. They all began to count them.
“I don’t really feel like playun,” Niven said. “I’d rather have a woman. But Jim’s a good sport. Jim will play,” he said hanging his head.
“What would you do with a woman?” Danforth asked combatively. Then grinning furtively, he glanced at La Bung and winked. “You ain’t got enough energy to get a hard on.”
“I’ve had my share of ass.”
“Yeh. You get yours from those comic books and pictures in those silk parachutes from the airdrops.”
“Up yours, Danforth,” Niven flushed slightly, glancing quickly around the group.
“Take it easy on him, old boy,” Lau’rel interposed. “Let’s get on with the game.”
“Fife card,” Billingsly said dealing. “Ve get fatha south ve get niiice vomen. Ven ve get near Bhamo,” Billingsly looked at Niven. “You like niiice goil, Du. Pretty. Billingsly get you niiice Shan goil,” he smiled picking up his hand.
“Thash my pal,” Niven said. “But don’t call them girls. They’re doll baby bitches to us Billingsly, myyy frien’.” Niven put his hand to his mouth and gagged.
“That’s niiice,” Billingsly said. “I remember. All goils ve call doll beby bitches. All boy friends. Doll boy bastards,” Billingsly laughed.
“I’m high,” Danforth said. “Jack bets one.”
They all called and La Bung raised two rupees.
Billingsly bit his lip.
The hand played out. La Bung La pulled it in.
“That’s bad luck winning the first hand,” Lau’rel said innocently.
La Bung La smiled crookedly, his lip quivering: “I do not believe in luck, Du Lau’rel.”
“Seven card,” Danforth said. “No ante.”
“Why doesn’t the Dukaba Reynolds play tonight?” Subadar Major La Bung La looked suspiciously around the group.
“He’s flippin,” Danforth said. “That goddamn monkey and letting the men burn fires. He’s had it.”
“You’re nuts,” Niven said sitting up straighter, trying to sober. “There ishn’t a damn thing wrong with Con. You’re gettin jumpy.”
Danforth stopped dealing and glared at Niven balefully: “Why you little punk. I ought.…”
Then they all heard it coming from down the hill; the familiar, evil sound of bullets in the crisp night. Everyone looked up. For one enduring instant no one moved; then simultaneously there was a concentrated activity all over the area.
“They’ve hit the outpost down the hill,” Lau’rel said simply. “Thanks for the evening, lads. I’m getting along.”
La Bung La had already disappeared and Danforth was standing. Son-of-a-bitch. Goddamned if he hadn’t felt it. It had been perfectly obvious. “I’ll see you bums at the CP,” he said disgustedly walking heavily away.
“That’s Mike Island’s outpost, isn’t it, Lau’rel my good frien’?” Niven said trying to push himself up, rapidly sobering. It was a hell of a time to be drunk, he thought.
“I’ll help you, old boy,” Lau’rel said standing now.
Billingsly was shouting orders to the mule skinners to pack up. There were scouts running in every direction through the area, heading for their positions on the line.
The firing below increased rapidly then slowed way down.
Niven staggered against Lau’rel then leaned against him, smiling boyishly. They started for the brush cutting across to the trail that wound down to Con’s C.P.
Earlier that evening Con had sat alone in the CP cleaning his carbine and .38 Colt. He had taken the folded slightly oiled square of flannel buffing cloth from his pack and laid it before him on the ground. Carefully he disassembled first the carbine and then the .38 setting each piece in perfectly aligned rows in order on the cloth. He had cleaned them thoroughly and wiped each part with a bore patch spread oily from a container of three-in-one oil. He had just finished testing the action of the .38 and loading it when Nautaung came back from inspecting his section of the line.
They had sat nursing a scotch and water staring into the fire. They did not speak but had looked at each other occasionally as if each were partaking of some ritual, the accomplishment of which depended partially on their silence. They sat erect and seemingly involved, yet alert and attuned to any sound that was unfamiliar to the pattern.
Occasionally they had heard the ticking of Nautaung’s watch. Once it seemed to slow, the seconds stretching into minutes. And Time became their enemy. They grew closer as it fiendishly opposed them. They fought to keep it on an even keel, at a steady pace. They knew how Time could defeat them if they did not subdue it; how it would race away when they needed it; how it lingered when they prayed for it to pass. They hardly breathed. They seemed to grimace as deliberately, calculatingly they fixed their minds to a new same level. They found the key. The seconds became seconds again. Silently the old wrinkled face had grinned. The deepset eyes under heavy brows had smiled.
After that they drank up.
A half hour later Nautaung looked at his watch. It was ninethirty, the very minute Billingsly was dealing the first hand of the card game in the headquarters kitchen area.
“Soon they should hit the outpost,” the old man looked up satisfyingly inhaling on his American cigarette.
“You feel it don’t you, Nautaung?” Con asked as he tied a long peacock feather to the band of his bush hat with a piece of medical gut.
“Yes, Dua. I am sure,” Nautaung said admiring the bunched force gathered in the white man’s shoulders and upper arms, visible through the tan Kashmir sweater.
“Well, we’ll learn how well we fight at night now,” Con
glanced up. “I have a feeling we’ll be lucky again tonight.”
“You like to make ambushes, Dua?”
“No. Nobody likes that really do they, old man?”
“There are those that believe they like it. I have seen them in every war,” Nautaung said, his Mongolian eyes squinting into the fire. “War is a very serious business. It is the most serious of all man’s experience in this life.
“But still, Dua, it is like everything that you do,” the old man nodded his head slowly. “You will get from it what you give. Give it the utmost thought, the most careful planning, the best of your decisions. And your patience. Above all your patience. Then you will never regret having warred.”
Con eyed the old man. Patience. He put the bush hat down and stroked his goatee, wondering if Nautaung knew how close he had come to quoting the greatest soldier of all. For eleven years Genghis Khan had had the most brilliant of his subject Chinese sages bring him the wisest of sayings. And from them all The Khan had chosen “Patience is the essential virtue” as his motto that would fly under the three oxtails that hung symbolically from his banner. Indeed it was a wise saying, Con thought. A truth not limited to war alone.
Con set the bush hat between his legs fleetingly admiring the peacock feather. Then he reached over to his pack and took out the mapcase and spread the map before him anchoring it against the night’s north wind with his hat.
That is very good the way he studies the map, Nautaung thought. Every time he studies the map it is more complete than the time before. He had worried too much for the young American. Maybe the Dua felt that. He was very sensitive to things like that, Nautaung knew, looking at Con as he ran his forefinger down the map with that faint look of disgust on his mouth, his young forehead furrowed alive with a hunger to know.
“Does the Subadar Major La Bung La expect that we might be attacked?” Con asked not looking up from the map.
“I do not think so, Dua.”
“Where is he now?” Con asked looking up into Nautaung’s quick black eyes, seeing the finely lined ancient face as it glimmered in the firelight.
“The Subadar Major plays cards with the Dus,” Nautaung raised one eyebrow.
Con smiled: “I thought he didn’t approve of the Subadars playing cards with the Dus.”
“We all change,” Nautaung said, butting his cigarette and placing it in an old battered incense tin he took from his breast pocket. “In war you change according to how things are. Even if you don’t want to change. Even if you don’t believe you can change.”
“I should know that by now,” Con looked over to the little bundled form of Scheherazade sleeping soundly.
“The monkey drinks very much lately,” Nautaung smiled.
Con looked back at the old man. He grinned, stroking his goatee. “She passed out again,” Con said in a serious new voice, then he looked back at the map. He folded the map, put the map into the mapcase, the mapcase in his pack, then looked up through the trees to the half moon: “That’s a good moon for an ambush don’t you think, Nautaung?”
“It is the very best for an ambush,” the old man said. “Many people would say it is an omen but it is merely the best moon to fight under. It does not give too much light or too little. It is.…”
Then they heard the firing as it started down the hill. They looked at each other penetratingly, longingly for an instant, acutely straining to identify the caliber of every shot that rang out from below. Then they heard the men scurrying for their positions, the shouting of orders, the jangle of equipment as it was thrown together.
“It is Du Island’s outpost,” Con said evenly.
“They come by the trail you expected, Dua,” Nautaung added. “So far it is well planned.”
“So far,” Con smiled. Deliberately, slowly he reached into his breast pocket and took out a pack of Chesterfields. Graspingly he held the pack at eye level.
Factory 49. North Carolina.
Chesterfields are …
Chesterfields are the finest …
Chesterfields are a balanced blend of the finest aromatic Turkish tobacco and the choicest of several American varieties.
Con turned the package, grinning. Precisely he took a cigarette from the pack, studied it, then lit it.
Subadar Major La Bung La came into the CP saluting breathlessly: “We have been attacked at the outpost,” he said the right side of his mouth quivering.
Con returned the salute: “Yes Subadar Major,” he spoke calmly. Then the firing slowed way down, then it stopped and in his mind Con pictured the outpost withdrawing to its secondary position.
“They see the fires, Dua,” La Bung La said hurriedly. “I will give orders that they put out all the fires.”
“No, Subadar Major,” Con said evenly. “Give orders that the fires are still to burn. Then return.”
La Bung La was visibly astonished. Then bewilderedly he looked at Nautaung who stared unconcernedly into the fire. For a moment La Bung did not move, then saluted and left.
There were a few scattered shots from below.
Con looked at his watch. The leaders would be in soon. Then he would know. He would see it. Some minute’ irregular difference that he could not isolate. The way they scratched their foreheads, or moved their mouths, or held their weapons. The look on their faces. The tone of their voices. He would feel it. It would say reluctantly: Not today. It is not my day. It would say proudly: Today is my day. I am ready.
Danforth came into the CP heavily. Con looked up at him: “Sit down, Johnny,” he said measuredly.
“We’ve been hit pretty hard,” the half Indian said sitting down next to Nautaung.
“It looks that way,” Con replied. “Stick around until the other leaders get in. We’ll talk it over then.”
Danforth began to question Nautaung about what he thought had hit the outpost. Con watched them. Danforth would be all right, he knew intuitively. The half Indian was more irritated than afraid.
There was a great deal of shouting in the camp.
Billingsly came in: “Ve get the hell out of here, eh, Dua?” he said saluting. “The mules and supplies they are gettin ready to get the hell out of here.” He was open mouthed and his eyes jumped nervously, Con saw.
“That’s right, Billingsly. Get ready to get moving,” Con said, watching Billingsly as he quickly started from the CP. “Come back and get the monkey later.” Con yelled after him. “And take good care of her,” he added seeing Billingsly throw his right arm in the air gesturing his reply.
Nautaung smiled. Con chuckled. Danforth laughed.
Someone started to shoot over by the radio headquarters on the other side of the hill and the running and the movement in the brush ceased as the men hit the ground. Con looked at Nautaung: “Someone’s got a trigger finger over there. Tell them we aren’t here to shoot snakes or mongoose. Stop that firing all around, Nautaung. The outpost is almost two miles from here. They won’t get this far for a long time.”
Deceptively, lightly the old man jumped up: “I will get message to all the units, Dua, to quiet them,” he said assuredly. Then he began to shout in the darkness as he went for the messengers: “Hold your fire. They are far away. Anyone that fires will answer to the Dua,” he said rapidly in Kachin.
There were several shooting now and Nautaung’s voice rose stronger. Then all the line was quiet. “Oh you jackasses,” Nautaung shouted, “who shoot at the wind that moves the brush.”
There was scattered laughter, then the bustling movements began again but there was no more shooting in the camp. Nautaung returned slowly to the CP. Ah, these young ones of my people, they are so anxious, so eager.
He came into the CP and they were all there sitting around the fire. The Subadars. The leaders of the mule trains. La Bung La. Lau’rel. Niven. Danforth. They talked in small groups: hurriedly; slowly; wonderingly; eagerly.
Nautaung saluted and they all looked up and around. They were all there now. They became silent. Con looked around at th
e semi-circle of leaders slowly. He turned to La Bung La: “Call all the runners here at once.”
La Bung La shouted and the runners came forward from the dark of the brush looking very young, very bewildered, their M-1 rifles slung and dangling close to the ground.
“Tell all the runners to go to their units and have them prepare to move out at the order,” Con looked back at La Bung La. “Tell all the units that anyone that fires a shot that is not a sure shot, at a true enemy, will have to answer to you, Subadar Major,” Con said crisply, authoritatively.
“Yes, Dua,” La Bung answered militarily, throwing his chest forward.
Con watched La Bung as he spoke to the runners. Nautaung studied Con. It was very well put, this issuing of orders by the young American, the old man thought. You get the feeling of his feeling of much luck. That is good. The confidence of the Dua’s voice is like a ripple on a jungle pool, spreading out in larger circles. Certainly it will only be a matter of minutes before the dullest of the men will feel the calm of his calm.
Con looked at Lau’rel, then to Niven. He could see that the radio operator was drunk. Lau’rel looked steady. He would have Lau’rel take care of Niven.
“I have taken an azimuth,” Con said when the Subadar Major had finished and the runners had left. “It is the Du Island’s outpost that has been hit.”
The firing from below came very heavy now and there was the thudding sound of grenades exploding and the chugging sound of a B.A.R. They all listened. A Nambu gun replied, in the short pinging bursts of its small caliber. The firing tapered down, evened off. The men looked around searching for that likeness that was in them.
They all seemed to glance at Con, then at Nautaung. The Dua did not seem bothered. Nautaung was certainly not. He had been through so much of this it had dulled him.
Nautaung watched Con. This calmness of the Dua was wearing off well on the leaders. That which a man searched and desired for always wore off on him easily.
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