THE PACIFIC
Bill 'Hoosier' Smith
PICSPAM

quotes from Helmet for my Pillow by Robert Leckie
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I met Hoosier the second day at New River. He had arrived two days before us, and Captain High-Hips had made him his runner. In that first unorganized week, his clothes were always spattered with mud from his countless trips through the mire between the captain’s office and the other huts. I disliked him at first. He seemed inclined to look down on us from his high position in Captain High-Hips’ office. He seemed surly, too, with his square strong figure, tow hair and blue eyes—his curt intelligences from on high: “Cap’n wants two men bring in the lieutenant’s box.”

But I was too inexperienced to see that the surliness was but a front for his being scared, like all of us. The immobile face was a façade; the forced downward curve of the mouth a hastily erected defense against the unknown. With time and friendship, that mouth would curve in a different direction, upward in a grin that was pure joy.

"If you can't fight 'em drunk, don't fight 'em at all"

Morning was the best time for the beer; it was cool with the cool of night and the dark sea beneath the sands...Hoosier became solemnly aware that he was not properly dressed. He had no trousers on. Such a breach of decorum, even in the company of men not customarily correct in these matters, seemed to pain the Hoosier. He lurched to his feet, groped for his missing trousers and staggered down to the water.

“Hey, Hoosier—where you going with those pants? You going to wash your pants, Hoosier?”

“Ah’m gonna put mah pants on.”

“In the water?”

He showed his big strong teeth in a silly grin: “Ah always put mah pants on in the ocean.”

His dignity was matchless. Each time the surf receded, he would place his left foot in the trouser leg. With the exaggerated care of the inebriate, he would draw that leg up, and then, while balanced precariously on the right foot, a wave would pound up behind him and smack him on his pink behind.

He arose each time in dignity. Gravely, he would go through it once more. Merrily, the wave would roll up again and let him have it. Once or twice, he would teeter for a moment on that disloyal right foot, looking quickly behind him with a half grin, as though to see if his old friend the wave were still there. It always was.

Such was the power of Japanese beer.

Chuckler and the Hoosier slept alongside each other, erecting their beds only inches apart, as did all other watch mates, such as Runner and myself. Their beds were about a dozen yards distant in the scrub between the pits and the jungle. It seemed that almost every night, while Runner and I lay whispering to each other, we would hear the thunderous progress of a land crab through the brush. We would hear, too, the snoring of the Hoosier, and we would cease to whisper and wait.

Then there would be silence, like the pause between notes of music. It would be broken, simultaneously, by an indignant shriek from Hoosier, a shout of laughter from the Chuckler and an unbelievable clatter-and-crash that was the land crab scuttling to safety.

“Dammit, Chuckler, it ain’t funny.”

“Whatsa matter, Chuckler? What happened?” That would be Runner, his voice strangled with suppressed laughter.

“It’s the crab again. Hoosier’s crab. It came through again and cut the rope and pinched Hoosier’s ass.” Hoosier’s reply shocked the night.

Finally the Hoosier got to his feet.

“Shoot me,” he pleaded. “Why’nt somebody be a good guy and shoot me?” He looked despairingly at the ocean, turned steely gray again and dimpled by the raindrops, and then glanced down at his own half-dry clothing. “Hell’s fire!” he swore, “what’s the use of waitin’”—and ran like a madman straight into the ocean.

We were gathered in the shade of the only tree on the river bank. Hoosier sat leaning against the trunk, whittling on a stick. He kept on plying the stick with his knife, slicing off long curly slivers of white wood, seeming not to care whether or not anyone heeded his words.

“They’re gonna whittle us,” he said, shaping his sentences proportionate to the slivers. “They come in last night against the Raiders, same as they come in against us. Sure, we beat them. So’d the Raiders. But ever’ time we lose a few chips. Ever’ time we lose a couple hundred men. What do they care what they lose? Life is cheap with them. They got plenty more, anyway.” He waved the stick. “They got plenty of sticks, but we just got the one, we just got us. Fellow from the Fifth came by this morning and said the Japs was unloading two more troop transports down at Kokum. They keep on whittlin’ us. Ever’ day we lose ten, twenty fellows from the bombing. Ever’ night Washing Machine Charlie gets a couple. When they hit us with them battleships, I dunno how many we lose.

“But they got it all their own way,” he continued, grunting as the knife cut into a hard spot, “‘cause we ain’t got no ships and we ain’t got no airplanes ‘cept a coupla Grummans that cain’t get off the ground half the time because we ain’t got no gasoline. They got the ships and they got the airplanes and it looks like they got the time, too. So Ah’m telling you”—the knife cut through and the stick broke—“they’re gonna whittle us.”

The Chuckler sought to make a joke of it.

“What’s eating you? You never had it so good. Here’s a guy getting lamb’s tongue in his rice and he wants to get back to civilization and stand in them long lines for his war bonds. Whaddya want—egg in your beer?”

“Don’t be a damn fool, Chuckler. Ah’m not kidding. They’re gonna wear us down.”

Hoosier arose and looked down at us with a glance of wearied exasperation. He strode away, and we sat there in silence. We felt like theology students whose instructor takes his leave after presenting the most compelling arguments against the existence of God. Our faith in victory had been unquestioning. Its opposite, defeat, had no currency among us. Victory was possible, that was all; it would be easy or difficult, quick or prolonged, but it would be victory. So here came the disturbing Hoosier, displaying the other side of the coin: showing us defeat.

Hoosier broke in sulkily, “Ah ain’t gonna parade. The hell with ‘em. Ah ain’t paradin’ for nobody. Soon as we get off the ship Ah’m gonna break ranks and lose m’self in the crowd.”

“Wouldn’t that be something?” said the Runner excitedly. “Supposing we came off the ship and everybody broke ranks and melted into the crowd. They couldn’t find you in a New York crowd. We’d all be gobbled up. Everybody’d be drunk, and they couldn’t do anything to you. Everybody’d be drunk, even the officers.”

Everyone fell dreamily silent, a quiet that was finally broken by the wistful voice of Hoosier.

“Ah bet they do, Chuckler—Ah bet they give us a parade.”

♥______♥

IN CONCLUSION: I'M BACK, BOOYAH!

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