“Hey, old man,” Niven shouted.
Nautaung started to rise.
“Sit down. Sit down, old man,” Niven staggered slightly. “You don’t have to get up for Jim boy.”
“Thank you, Du Niven,” Nautaung said respectfully. He liked the young Du and loved to watch him while he operated the radio. The old Kachin always had great respect for men who could operate such machines with such assurance.
“Coming to my party?” Niven asked sitting down loosely on the blanket opposite the old man.
“The Dua Con has sent a message and told me of it. I am honored.”
“Drink?” Niven took the canteen from his belt.
“Laku, Du?”
“Scotch.”
“What’s the difference? Laku. Scotch.” Nautaung smiled and reached for the canteen. “To a manau of joy,” the old man drank.
Niven drank, wrinkled his nose, drank again. “I see where La Bung gave you all the dirty details again,” he said inquisitively.
Nautaung looked quizzical.
“You know what I mean, Nautaung. You don’t have to fool Jim boy. I know La Bung’s got it in for you.”
Nautaung paused, momentarily immobile: “That is not bad, Du,” he said seriously. “All men have their purpose.”
“What kind of purpose is there in that,” Niven spoke sarcastically. “Holdin’ it over a man with rank.”
“There are two ways to look at everything, young Du,” Nautaung took the cigarette Niven offered him. “If I get a little more of the work it only increases the efficiency of my men. If my men get better I must be better for them. If I am better, my superiors must be better for me.” Nautaung lit the cigarette meditating. “I am free to ask of my men things that the other Subadars are not. For if I order them they will say ‘we will do it. For the old man does not really want us to do it. It is from higher up this order really comes.’” Nautaung smiled.
“That’s pretty good, Nautaung,” Niven said thoughtfully. “Say that’s goddamn good. Son-of-a-bitch if that isn’t good. All the time he thinks he’s kicking you around and you’re using him,” Niven laughed.
“I do not mean to use him, Du. It is not good to use a man really. But you must take whatever you can from a man that you can use, to the good of things as they are.”
“You mean you don’t get a kick out of foolin’ him?”
“I do not fool him, Du. A man fools himself. After a few more wars you will see it,” Nautaung inhaled deeply. “What fine cigarettes,” he said soothingly.
“Here, have another drink,” Niven passed the canteen. “But I still wouldn’t let a man push me around like that. I sure as hell wouldn’t,” he pondered, then in a weaker voice: “No, I don’t think I would.”
“Hey, Nautaung. Look,” Niven pointed excitedly. “There’s Con taking a bath. I’m going to take old Con a little drink,” he reached for the canteen. “By God I may even take Jim a little bath,” he put his nose down to his armpit and sniffed.
Nautaung laughed.
“By God, I think I will take a little bath,” Niven got up. “I’ll see you tonight, old man.” Niven walked away reeling slightly. “Tonight,” he hollered, his back to Nautaung.
“I’m a poor little sheep who has lost his way.…” Nautaung heard him singing as he moved upstream.
“Baa, baa, baa.…” It faded away, and once again the old quick eyes began to search the valley. Three times swiftly the eyes traversed the land seeing cluster after cluster of young Scouts laughingly active in their inactivity. But Nautaung could not see the American half-Indian John Danforth lying flat on his stomach, his chin on his hands in the grass near the headquarters.
In front of the reservation-born Klamath Indian was his knife hilt deep in the ground. The knife bisected his line of vision so that he looked out past it like a rifle sight out towards the men as they painted on the totems and dug the holes where they would erect them.
He had been feeling screwy all day. Nostalgia, that’s what he had. What a word. That rich-bitch, the married one he had picked up at the Golden State Track out of Frisco had always used that word. She kept on saying she had the worse case of nostalgia and she had to get back to New York to get over it. She was what the money boys called class. That’s what they said she was, but they didn’t know, and she had taught him some other things that he didn’t know about society people. Like later on the next week after he had been with her and had gone with some “running mates” down to nigger town to pick up on a new spade band. And there she was: his class woman, his society woman of the Race Track looking like a picture out of one of them women’s dress magazines, sitting way over in the corner with another doll that looked like she came out of them same magazines, and what they were doing right out in that crowded room didn’t look like either one of them had any case of nostalgia.
Danforth closed his eyes momentarily, his mind a deep fathomless void, a sweet tender nothing, and then everything became all mixed up again. There were so many things that he couldn’t figure out, like how the salmon would come up the Oregon rivers and spawn and the minnows go out to sea, way out in the endless Pacific where there were no road signs, where they had never been before, only to return up the very same river seven or eight years later to spawn themselves and die. How did you figure out things like that; it didn’t make sense.
Never had he thought as much of his childhood as he had since he entered this valley a few hours ago. It was hard to believe that anyplace in the world could look so much like Oregon, feel so much like it. It brought alive many things that he had not thought about in so many years, things he had trained himself not to think about, things that had annoyed him once, but now they didn’t seem as if they had been real at all. Being part Indian didn’t seem to hamper a man half as much out here, he thought, as it did back in the States. After all Lau’rel was darker than him and he was American born, or Philippine born which was just like being Indian reservation born, and Lau’rel’s color didn’t seem to bother him. Maybe he was wrong the way he felt about being part Indian.
Now you’re sentimental again. Keep it up smart boy and see what happens to you. Won’t you ever remember what happens to you every time you got sentimental and and wanted to “co-operate?” Didn’t it cost you three months in solitary and pull of two years because you got sentimental and wanted to co-operate? Jesus! Why was a man born anyhow? He was so goddamn mixed-up.
How he wanted to blot out everything, to float away on the intoxication of nothing into a world of nothing, the sweet perfume of nothing, the Waldorf of nothing, cocktails for two of nothing, a piece of ass of nothing, his mind whirled.
Danforth raised up above the knife and put his elbows to the ground, resting his chin on his hands. He stared out at the totems, the designs that were different but strangely familiar to those of his American tribe. What was the connection?
“Hello, Geronimo,” Niven said sarcastically. “Why aren’t you out helping the boys put up the totems. Don’t you know about totems?”
“Beat it, Pullmotor,” Danforth said coldly, not looking up.
“What’s a matter, Chief?” Niven pressed. “No wanna smoke-um pipe of peace for manau.”
“Beat it,” Danforth said incisively. He looked up and glared.
Niven stared down at him drunkenly. “Aw come ’on, Johnny,” he said sincerely. “Let’s get off it. I’m willin’ to get off it.”
“Look, punk. Screw.”
Niven stared at him. The Indian was handsome all right. He was dark, handsome, like a Valentino. Son-of-a-bitch if he looked Indian at all. “All right, I’ll ‘screw,’ Big Chief,” he said sarcastically again. “But don’t forget I tried to end this thing. Don’t take it out on me just because you’re waking up to the fact that your gallant ancestors came from around here,” Niven paused.
“You’re such a smart shit the way you look down on these people, Big Chief. As if they weren’t good enough for you. And all the time they’re your blood ancestors,”
Niven laughed. “They passed over the Bering Strait to America, Big Chief. But you wouldn’t know about the Bering.…”
“If you don’t blow this minute I’ll cut you in half, you snotty spoiled little shit,” Danforth was eyeing him balefully. He reached for his knife.
“Down boy,” Niven giggled, putting his hands, palms front, backing away. “Take it easy. Forget it.” He backed about ten feet then turned and walked away rapidly glancing back twice over his shoulder.
Danforth plunged the knife back into the ground and sat there, leaning on one arm, staring at it. For a long time he did not move, then he reached in his pocket for a cigarette.
And now that Danforth’s body was above the skyline Nautaung could see him. He had watched him ever since the half-Indian’s body rose partly amputated by the valley grass to talk to Niven. For a long time Danforth did not move, then he got up abruptly walking towards the headquarters supply dump. He walked heavily with his head down and Nautaung did not like it. It was one thing to march along with your head down looking at your feet, it was another thing to walk with your head down when you were in a rest area.
The afternoon passed on and the drums began to beat. The sun was going down and the hills took on a deeper, richer red and the stream was turning a darker blue and the ripple seemed louder. Two of the totems were now up, Nautaung saw, and the men were gathering around the third and many shots were being fired. There was much shouting at the north end of the camp as the first two mules of the laku party returned loaded, and the smoke from the fires spiraled up black against the blue sky and the white clouds.
“Hello friend of my father’s father,” a young voice spoke in Kachin.
“Ayhee,” Nautaung smiled looking up at the young Kachin. “I did not hear you approach. My old thoughts are far away. Sit down, Bye Ya, grandson of my friend.”
“I was passing, oh great soldier, and saw you sitting, and thought that you might wish a little friendship to pass the time,” the young Scout grinned mischievously. “And besides, after I have offered you some of the laku I have with so much will saved, I will probably ask of you a favor.”
“Ayhee. You speak like your grandfather. You have his way,” Nautaung chuckled. “Your tongue is smooth like the back of a snake. Your eyes they are clever and have a way like the elephants,” the man said, looking at the young Kachin in his GI woolen pants, but barefooted, barechested, brown shiny clean.
“I have just bathed in the stream,” Bye Ya said putting down the canteen and a piece of bamboo about a foot and a half long. “It is a fine stream. Very cold. And clean as it should be,” Bye Ya ran his hand through his still wet black hair. “Do you not believe that this stream might flow from the Magic Mountain at the top of the world? Friend of my grandfather, my friend.”
“The Mountain is the true source of all rivers,” Nautaung said looking north towards the Himalayas, invisible before the white cumulus clouds floating against the blue sky.
“Here,” the young Kachin handed Nautaung his GI canteen. “Try some of my laku. I have saved it religiously. It is very good laku.”
“You have saved it long?” Nautaung opened the canteen.
“Four months now. Is it not true that every good Kachin warrior must keep a little of his own laku should he be wounded? To ease the pain of his wound,” Bye Ya said proudly.
“It is true,” the old man said.
“And is it not true that we will drink much laku here. It is not just rumour that fifteen mules have gone in search of laku?”
“It is true. Already some of the laku party has returned,” Nautaung sniffed the open canteen. “You will have plenty of laku with which to fill your canteen before you leave here.” Nautaung drank, smacked his lips, then wiped his mouth with the back of hand. “Ayeee. It is the very best laku. Where did you get it?”
“My mother. She gave it to me. It is from Bhamo and over twelve years old,” Bye Ya said proudly. Nautaung handed him the canteen.
“Have an American cigarette,” Nautaung reached into his pocket and carefully took one cigarette from the pack and handed it to Bye Ya. Then he took one more cigarette, admiring it as he rolled it over and over between his fingers. “They are the finest cigarettes in the world. Smoke it now. Smoke it carefully. Enjoy it fully.”
“Yes, my friend,” Bye Ya said delightedly. “I have only smoked one other American cigarette and they are the very best. Like the American Dua Con. The very best.”
“Yes. Like that,” Nautaung said seriously.
Nautaung struck a match and they lit up.
“Is it true that it is written that the Dua Con is destined to become the Dukaba of all Dukabas?” Bye Ya asked inhaling deeply.
“I believe that it is destined,” the old man said solemnly.
“He marches as fast and swift as the spotted leopard. Never has there been a white man who marches as fast or swift, the old soldiers say?” Bye Ya questioned.
“Never.”
Nearby four Kachins passed and Nautaung saw Bye bow his head sheepishly. “Ah,” he kidded seriously. “You are afraid to have your fellow soldiers see you sitting with a Subadar. You are ashamed to be seen talking to an old man like Nautaung?”
“Oh no, friend of my grandfather,” Bye Ya said not looking up, blushing redly.
“You are afraid they will say that you seek promotion. They will taunt you,” Nautaung laughed. “I know. I know. Always soldiers need to make jokes.”
“You see through me, old man,” Bye Ya looked up pouting.
“No. It happened to me when I was young,” Nautaung said confidingly. “All I know I have seen and heard once.”
“It all happened to you too, friend of mine?”
“To all soldiers at one time or another, Bye Ya.”
“Here,” Bye Ya picked up the bamboo stick. “Within is honey rice candycake. This I have also saved. Try some. My mother made it for me before I left. I have saved it religiously also.”
“It must be a big favor that you are going to ask of me,” Nautaung said. He took out his trench knife, pushed the honeycake out from the hollow of the bamboo and sliced off a piece.
“It is not a big favor for such a soldier as you,” Bye Ya grinned directly. “For one of such influence as you.”
“Ay. Just like your grandfather,” Nautaung chuckled. “A way as slippery as the scales of a fish still wet from the water. What is it you wish?” Nautaung bit into the honey cake.
“I wish that you might arrange, oh great soldier, friend of my grandfather, my friend,” Bye Ya said elaborately, “I wish you would arrange that I should go with the hunting party that will pass close to the village of Warabum.”
“Ahaaa,” Nautaung said loudly. “You have business there.”
“Yes, friend of my father’s father.”
“And what kind of business?”
“The … the.…” Bye bowed his head. “The love of my life she is there. I long for her.”
“You are pledged?” the old man asked seriously.
“We are pledged.”
“She is not your first?”
“There were many. They were like stars the others,” Bye Ya said from a distance. “But when I saw her I saw for the first time the moon. And she has given me a girl-child. And I have never seen this child. And I am worried for her, for never have I made offerings to the spirits to protect her, never have I built cages to catch the evil spirits. Of this I am very afraid. And I do not sleep nights very well,” Bye Ya said solemnly.
“Ahhh,” Nautaung said understandingly. He drank of the laku and passed the bottle to Bye Ya. “Drink.”
“And why do you just not tell the Subadar Major that you are leaving?” Nautaung asked. “You have no contract to stay in this army. Why don’t you just return to your woman and forget the war?” Nautaung probed. Bye Ya looked up peering.
“I am a Kachin,” he said proudly. “I fight to protect my land. My freedom. As my forefathers have. If I wish to hold my head high in this land tha
t I love I will fight as you fight,” he said almost bitterly. “I will fight more than you fight. You question the wrong man, oh Subadar. I am no man-woman like the Shan,” he said redly vehement.
“Ho-ho,” Nautaung laughed. “And you have the spirit of your father’s father. Ayyy. That is good, young friend. You shall have your wish,” Nautaung paused.
The young Kachin’s black eyes softened and he laughed embarrassedly.
“Tell me, young Bye Ya, one more thing,” Nautaung spoke softly. “What will be your specialty after the war.”
“I am going to be a professional man,” Bye Ya said proudly. “It is my intention to raise the finest of fighting cocks. Some day I hope to fight my cocks even in the rings of Mandalay.”
“That is good,” Nautaung said softly, seriously. “It is good life. Your grandfather should be well pleased.”
“Thank you, oh Subadar.”
“It is my hunting party that goes near the village of your love. You shall see her. I promise,” Nautaung reached for the laku, drank finishing it, then handed the canteen to Bye Ya. “We leave one hour before the sunrise, young one. Tomorrow. Now go your way,” he said sternly. “Join your young friends. Make much of your rest for there are many battles ahead. Go,” he motioned. “Get out of here,” Nautaung looked away.
He heard the young Kachin’s merry good-byes melt into the dusk and sounds of the camp. Ayee. It was the very best laku. Twelve years old. One so young as Bye Ya certainly had no real appreciation for twelve year old laku.
Nautaung got up and folded the blanket. The sun was beyond the hills now and it was growing dark. The third totem was up and the three high bonfires blazed and the drums beat and the men were beginning to dance. Up at the head of the valley Nautaung saw some of the nearby villagers walking towards the headquarters bearing gifts. The Dua Con was standing near the edge of the valley grass talking to his monkey, and the Du Danforth was walking towards the white officer. The generator began to whrrr. Niven was sending the evening message.
Never So Few Page 13