From Here to Eternity (83 page)

jumped down off of. "What you want me to do, First?" Stark said; his face still had the same expression of blank, flat refusal - like a stomach flatly refusing food - that he had had in the messhall; "what about the kitchen force? I'm pretty drunk, but I can still shoot a BAR." "I want you to get your ass in the kitchen with every man you got and start packing up," Warden said, looking at him. He rubbed his hand hard over his own face. "We'll be movin out for the beach as soon as this tapers off a little, and I want that kitchen all packed and ready to roll. Full field. Stoves and all. While you're doin that, make a big pot of coffee on the big stove. Use the biggest #18 pot you got." "Right," Stark said, and took off for the door into the messhall. "Wait!" Warden hollered. "On second thought, make two pots. The two biggest you got. We're going to need it." "Right," Stark said, and went on. His voice was not blank, his voice was crisp. It was just his face, that was blank. "The rest of you guys," Warden said. Seeing their faces, he broke off and rubbed his own face again. It didnt do any good. As soon as he stopped rubbing it settled right back into it, like a campaign hat that had been blocked a certain way. "I want the BAR men to report to the supplyroom right now and get their weapons and all the loaded clips they can find and go up on the roof. When you see a Jap plane, shoot at it. Dont worry about wasting ammo. Remember to take a big lead. Thats all. Get moving. "The rest of you guys," Warden said, as the "BAR men moved away at a run. "The rest of you guys. The first thing. The main thing. Every platoon leader is responsible to me personally to see that all of his men stay inside, except the BAR men up on the roof. A rifleman's about as much good against a low flying pursuit ship as a boy scout with a slingshot. And we're going to need every man we can muster when we get down to beach positions. I dont want none of them wasted here, by runnin outside to shoot rifles at airplanes. Or by goin souvenir huntin. The men stay inside. Got it?" There was a chorus of hurried vacant nods. Most of the heads were on one side, listening to the planes going over in ones and twos and three. It looked peculiar to see them all nodding on one side like that. Warden found himself wanting to laugh excitedly. 'The BARs will be up on the roof," he said. "They can do all the shooting that we can supply ammo for. Anybody else will just be getting in the way." "What about my MGs, Milt?" Peter Karelsen asked him. The easy coolness in old Pete's voice shocked Warden to a full stop. Drunk or not, Pete seemed to be the only one who sounded relaxed, and Warden remembered his two years in France. "Whatever you think, Pete," he said. "I'll take one. They couldnt load belts fast enough to handle more than one. I'll take Mikeovitch and Grenelli up with me to handle it." "Can you get the muzzle up high enough on those ground tripods?" "We'll put the tripod over a chimney," Pete said. "And then hold her down by the legs." "Whatever you think, Pete" Warden said, thinking momentarily how wonderful it was to be able to say that. "Come on, you two," Pete said, almost boredly, to his two section leaders. "We'll take Grenelli's because we worked on it last." "Remember," Warden said to the rest of them as Pete left with his two machinegunners. "The men stay inside. I dont care how you handle it. Thats up to you. I'm going to be up on the roof with a BAR. If you want to get in on the fun, go yourself. Thats where I'm going to be. But make damn sure your men are going to stay inside, off the porches, before you go up." "Like hell!" Liddell Henderson said. "You aint goin to catch this Texan up on no roof. Ah'll stay down with ma men." "Okay," Warden said, jabbing a finger at him. "Then you are hereby placed in charge of the loading detail. Get ten or twelve men, as many as you can get in the supplyroom, and put them to loading BAR clips and MG belts. We're going to need all the ammo we can get. Anybody else dont want to go up?" "I'll stay down with Liddell," Champ Wilson said. "Then you're second-in-command of the loading detail," Warden said. "All right:, lets go. If anybody's got a bottle laying around, bring it up with you. I'm bringing mine." When they got out to the porch, they found a knot of men arguing violently with S/Sgt Malleaux in front of the supply-room. "I dont give a damn," Malleaux said. "Thats my orders. I cant issue any live ammo without a signed order from an officer." "But there aint no goddamned officers, you jerk!" somebody protested angrily. "Then there aint no live ammo," Malleaux said. "The officers may not get here till noon!" "I'm sorry, fellows," Malleaux said. "Thats my orders. Lt Ross give them to me himself. No signed order, no ammo." "What the fuckin hell is all this?" Warden said. "He wont let us have any ammo, Top," a man said. "He's got it locked up and the keys in his pocket," another one said. "Gimme them keys," Warden said. 'Thats my orders, Sergeant," Malleaux said, shaking his head. "I got to have a signed order from an officer before I can issue any live ammo to an enlisted man." Pete Karelsen came out of the kitchen and across the porch wiping his mouth off with the back of his hand. From the screendoor Stark disappeared inside putting a pint bottle back into his hip pocket under his apron. "What the hells the matter?" Pete asked his two machine-gunners happily. "He wont give us no ammo, Pete," Grenelli said indignantly. "Well for - Jesus Christ!" Pete said disgustedly. "Thats my orders, Sergeant," Malleaux said irrefragably. From the southeast corner of the quad a plane came over firing, the tracers leading irrevocably in under the porch and up the wall as he flashed over, and the knot of men dived for the stairway. "Fuck your orders!" Warden bawled. "Gimme them goddam keys!" Malleaux put his hand in his pocket protectively. "I cant do that Sergeant. I got my orders, from Lt Ross himself." "Okay," Warden said happily. "Chief, bust the door down." To Malleaux he said, "Get the hell out of the way." Choate, and Mikeovitch and Grenelli the two machine-gunners, got back for a run at the door, the Chiefs big bulk towering over the two lightly built machinegunners. Malleaux stepped in front of the door. "You cant get by with this, Sergeant," he told Warden. "Go ahead," Warden grinned happily at the Chief. "Bust it down. He'll get out of the way." Across the quad, there were already two men up on top of the Headquarters Building. Chief Choate and the two machinegunners launched themselves at the supply room door like three blocking backs bearing down on an end. Malleaux stepped out of the way. The door rattled ponderously. "This is your responsibility, Sergeant," Malleaux said to Warden. "I did my best." "Okay," Warden said. "I'll see you get a medal." "Remember I warned you, Sergeant," Malleaux said. "Get the fuck out of my way," Warden said. It took three tries to break the wood screws loose enough to let the Yale night lock come open. Warden was the first one in. The two machinegunners were right behind him, Mikeovitch burrowing into a stack of empty belt boxes looking for full ones while Grenelli got his gun lovingly out of the MG rack. There were men up on both the 3rd and 1st Battalion roofs by now, to meet the planes as they came winging back, on first one then the other of the cross legs of their long figure 8. Warden grabbed a BAR from the rack and passed it out with a full bag of clips. Somebody grabbed it and took off for the roof, and somebody else stepped up to receive one. Warden passed out three of them from the rack, each with a full bag of clips, before he realized what he was doing. "To hell with this noise," he said to Grenelli who was unstrapping his tripod on his way out the door. "I could stand here and hand these out all day and never get up on the roof." He grabbed a BAR and clip bag for himself and pushed out the door, making a mental note to eat Malleaux's ass out. There were a dozen bags of full clips in there, left over from the BAR practice firing in August. They should have been unloaded and greased months ago. Outside, he stopped beside Henderson. Pete, Grenelli and Mikeovitch were already rounding the stair landing out of sight with the MG and eight belt boxes. "Get your ass in there and start passing them out," Warden told Henderson, "and start loading clips. And belts. Have Wilson go up and get a detail of men. Soons you get a batch loaded send a couple men up with them. Put three men on belts, the rest on BAR clips." "Yes, Sir," Henderson said nervously. Warden took off for the stairs. On the way up he stopped off at his room to get the full bottle that he kept in his foot-locker for emergencies. In the squadroom men were sitting on their bunks with their helmets on holding empty rifles in black despair. They looked up hopefully and called to him as he passed. "What gives, Sarge?" "Whats the deal, First?" "Are we going up on the roofs now?" "Where the hells the ammunition, Top?" "These guns aint worth nothing without no ammunition." "Hell of a note to sit on your bunk with an empty rifle and no ammunition while they blow your guts out." "Are we sojers? or boy-scouts?" Other men, the ones who had slept through breakfast and were now getting up tousle-headed and wide-eyed, stopped dressing and looked hopefully to see what he'd say. "Get into field uniforms," Warden said, realizing he had to say something. "Start rolling full field packs," he told them ruthlessly in an iron voice. "We're moving out in fifteen minutes. Full field equipment." Several men threw their rifles on their beds disgustedly. "Then what the hell're you doin with a BAR?" somebody hollered. "Field uniforms," Warden said pitilessly, and went on across the squadroom. "Full field equipment. Squad leaders, get them moving." Disgustedly, the squad leaders began to harangue them to work. In the far doorway onto the outside porch Warden stopped. In the corner under an empty bunk that had three extra mattresses piled on it, S/Sgt Turp Thornhill from Mississippi lay on the cement floor in his underwear with his helmet on hugging his empty rifle. "You'll catch a cold Turp," Warden said. "Dont go out there, First Sergeant!" Turp pleaded. "You'll be killed! They shootin it up! You'll be dead! You'll not be alive any more! Dont go out there!" "You better put your pants on," Warden said. In his room on the porch splinters of broken glass lay all over Warden's floor, and a line of bullet holes was stitched across the top of his foot-locker and up the side of Pete's locker and across its top. Under Pete's locker was a puddle and the smell of whiskey fumes was strong in the air. Cursing savagely, Warden unlocked his footlocker and flung back the lid. A book in the tray had a slanting hole drilled right through its center. His plastic razor box was smashed and the steel safety razor bent almost double. Savagely he jerked the tray out and threw it on the floor. In the bottom of the locker two .30 caliber bullets were nestled in the padding of rolled socks and stacked underwear, one on either side of the brown quart bottle. The bottle was safe. Warden dropped the two bullets into his pocket and got the unbroken bottle out tenderly and looked in his wall locker to make sure his recordplayer and records were safe. Then he hit the floor in the broken glass, holding the bottle carefully and under him, as another plane went over going east over the quad. As he beat it back out through the squadroom the men were beginning bitterly to roll full field packs. All except Turp Thornhill, who was still under the bunk and four mattresses in his helmet and underwear; and Private Ike Galovitch, who was lying on top his bunk with his rifle along his side and his head under his pillow. On the empty second floor, from which men were hurriedly carrying their full field equipment downstairs to roll into packs, at the south end of the porch by the latrine Readall Treadwell was going up the ladder in the latrine-supplies closet to the roof hatch carrying a BAR and grinning from ear to ear. "First time in my goddam life," he yelled down; "I'm really goin to git to shoot a BAR, by god. I wount never of believe it." He disappeared through the hatch and Warden followed him on up, and out into the open. Across G Company's section of roof most of G Company's first-three-graders were waiting to meet the enemy from behind one of the four chimneys, or else down on their knees in one of the corners, the BAR forearms propped on the crotch-high wall, or a chimney top, their muzzles looking eagerly into the sky, and their bottles of whiskey sitting beside them close up against the wall. Reedy Treadwell, who did not have a bottle, was just dropping down happily beside Chief Choate, who did. Two of the first-threegraders had hopped across the wall onto F Company's roof and were standing behind two of their chimneys. A knot of first-three-graders from F Co were just coming up through their own hatch. They crossed the roof and began to argue violently with the two first-three-graders from G Co, demanding their chimneys. All down the 2nd Battalion roof, and on the 1st and 3rd Battalion roofs, first-three-graders were coming up through the hatches eagerly with BARs, rifles, pistols, and here and there a single MG. There were a few buck sergeants visible among them, but the only privates visible anywhere were Readall Treadwell and the two other BAR men from G Co. "Throw your empty clips down into the Compny Yard," Warden hollered as he moved down the roof. "Pass it along. Throw your empty clips down in the Compny Yard. The loading detail will pick em up. Throw your empty -" A V of three planes came winging over from the southeast firing full blast, and the waiting shooters cheered happily like a mob of hobos about to sit down to their first big meal in years. All the artillery on all the roofs cut loose in a deafening roar and the earth stopped. The argument on F Co's roof also stopped, while both sides all dived behind the same chimney. Warden turned without thinking, standing in his tracks, and fired from the shoulder without a rest, the bottle clutched tightly between his knees. The big BAR punched his shoulder in a series of lightning left jabs. On his right Pete Karelsen was happily firing the little aircooled .30 caliber from behind the chimney while Mikeovitch and Grenelli hung grimly onto the bucking legs of the tripod laid over the chimney, bouncing like two balls on two strings. The planes sliced on over, unscathed, winging on down to come back up the other leg of the big figure 8. Everybody cheered again anyway, as the firing stopped. "Holymarymotherofgod," Chief Choate boomed in his star basso that always took the break-line of the Regimental song uncontested. "I aint had so much fun since granmaw got her tit caught in the wringer." "Shit!" old Pete said
disgustedly in a low voice behind Warden. "He was on too much of an angle. Led him too far." Warden lowered his BAR, his belly and throat tightening with a desire to let loose a high hoarse senseless yell of pure glee. This is my outfit. These are my boys. He got his bottle from between his knees and took a drink that was not a drink but an expression of feeling. The whiskey burned his throat savagely joyously. "Hey, Milt!" Pete called him. "You can come over here with us if you want. We got enough room for you and the bottle." "Be right with you!" Warden roared. Gradually his ears had become aware of a bugle blowing somewhere insistently, the same call over and over. He stepped to the inside edge of the roof and looked down over the wall. 'In the corner of the quad at the megaphone, among all the men running back and forth, the guard bugler was blowing The Charge. "What the fuck are you doing," Warden bellowed. The bugler stopped and looked up and shrugged sheepishly. "You got me," he yelled back. "Colonel's orders." He went on blowing. "Here they come, Pete!" Grenelli hollered. "Here comes one!" His voice went off up into falsetto excitedly. It was a single, coming in from the northeast on the down leg of the 8. The voice of every gun on the roofs rose to challenge his passage, blending together in one deafening roar like the call of a lynch mob. Down below, the running men melted away and the bugler stopped blowing and ran back under the E Company porch. Warden screwed the cap back on his bottle and ran crouching over to Pete's chimney and swung around to fire, again with no rest. His burst curved off in tracer smoke lines well behind the swift-sliding ship that was up, over, and then gone. Got to take more lead. "Wouldnt you know it?" Pete said tragically. "Shot clear behind that one. "Here, Mike," he said. "Move back a little and make room for the 1st/Sgt so he can fire off the corner for a rest. You can set the bottle down right here, Milt. Here," he said, "I'll take it for you." "Have a drink first," Warden said happily. "Okay." Pete wiped his soot-rimmed mouth with the back of his sleeve. There were soot flecks on his teeth when he grinned. "Did you see what they done to our room?" "I seen what they done to your locker," Warden said. From down below came the voice of the bugle blowing The Charge again. "Listen to that stupid bastard," Warden said. "Colonel Delbert's orders." "I dint think the Colonel'd be up this early," Pete said. "Old Jake must of served his first hitch in the Cavalry," Warden said. "Say, listen," Grenelli said, "listen, Pete. When you going to let me take it a while?" "Pretty soon," Pete said, "pretty soon." "Throw your empty clips down in the Compny Yard, you guys!" Warden yelled around the roof. "Throw your empty clips down in the Compny Yard. Pass it along, you guys." Down along the roof men yelled at each other to throw the empties down into the yard and went right on piling them up beside them. "God damn it!" Warden roared, and moved out from behind the chimney. He walked down along behind them like a quarterback bolstering up his linemen. "Throw them clips down, goddam you Frank. Throw your clips down, Teddy." "Come on, Pete," Grenelli said behind him. "Let me take it a while now, will you?" "I got firsts on it," Mikeovitch said. "Like hell!" Grenelli said. "Its my gun, aint it?" "Shut up," Pete said. "Both of you. You'll both get your chance. Pretty soon." Warden was behind the Chief and Reedy Treadwell on the inside edge when the next ones came in, a double flying in in echelon from the northeast like the single, and he dropped down beside them. Down below the bugler stopped blowing and ran back in under the E Company porch again. Straight across from Warden on the roof of the Headquarters Building there were only two men up. One of them he recognized as M/Sgt Big John Deterling, the enlisted football coach. Big John had a .30 caliber water-cooled with no tripod, holding it cradled in his left arm and firing it with his right. When he fired a burst, the recoil staggered him all over the roof. The winking noseguns of the incoming planes cut two foot-wide swathes raising dust across the quad and up the wall and over the D Co roof like a wagon road through a pasture. Warden couldnt fire at them from laughing at Big John Deterling on the Headquarters roof. This time Big John came very near to falling down and spraying the roof. The other man up over there had wisely put the chimney between him and Big John, instead of between him and the planes. "Look at that son of a bitch," Warden said, when he could stop laughing. Down below the loading detail dived out to pick up the clips in the lull, and the bugler ran back to the megaphone. "I been watching him," Chief grinned. "The son of a bitch is drunk as a coot. He was down to Mrs Kipfer's last night when me and Pete was there." "I hope his wife dont find out," Warden said. "He ought to have a medal," Chief said still laughing. "He probly will," Warden grinned. As it turned out, later, he did. M/Sgt John L Deterling; the Silver Star; for unexampled heroism in action. Another V of three flashed sliding in from the southeast and Warden turned and ran back to Pete's chimney as everybody opened up with a joyous roar. Firing with the BAR forearm resting on his hand on the chimney corner, he watched his tracers get lost in the cloud of tracers around the lead plane spraying the nose, spraying the cockpit and on back into the tail assembly. The plane shivered like a man trying to get out from under a cold shower and the pilot jumped in his seat twice like a man tied to a hot stove. They saw him throw up his arms helplessly in a useless try to ward it off, to stop it pouring in on him. There was a prolonged cheer. A hundred yards beyond the quad, with all of them watching now in anticipatory silence, the little Zero began to fall off on one wing and slid down a long hill of air onto one of the goalposts of the 19th Infantry football field. It crashed into flames. A vast happy college-yell cheer went up from the quad and helmets were thrown into the air and backs were slapped as if our side had just made a touchdown against Notre Dame. Then, as another V of three came in from the northeast, there was a wild scramble for helmets. "You got him, Pete!" Grenelli yelled, bobbing around on the bucking tripod leg, "you got him!" "Got him hell," Pete said without stopping firing. "Nobody'll ever know who got that guy." "Hey, Milt!" In the lull, Chief Choate was yelling at him from the roof edge. "Hey, Milt! Somebody's yellin for you down below." "Comin up!" Warden bawled. Behind him as he ran, Grenelli was pleading: "Come on, Pete. Let me take it for a while now. You got one already." "In a minute," Pete said. "In a minute. I just want to try one more." Looking down over the wall, Warden saw Lt Ross standing in the yard looking up angrily, large bags under his eyes, a field cap on his uncombed head, his pants still unbuttoned, and his shoes untied and his belt unbuckled. He started buttoning his pants without looking down. "What the hell are you doing up there, Sergeant?" he yelled. "Why arent you down here taking care of the Company? We're going to move out for the beach in less than an hour. Its probably alive with Japs already." "It's all taken care of," Warden yelled down. "The men are rolling full field packs right now in the squadroom." "But we've got to get the kitchen and supply ready to move, too, goddam it," Lt Ross yelled up. "The kitchen is bein pack," Warden yelled down. "I gave Stark the orders and he's doing it now. Should be all ready in fifteen minutes." "But the supply -" Lt Ross started to yell up. "They're loading clips and belts for us," Warden yelled down. "All they got to do is carry the water-cooled MGs for the beach out to the trucks and throw in Leva's old field repair kit and they ready to go. "And," he yelled, "they makin coffee and sandwidges in the kitchen. Everything's all taken care of. Whynt you get a BAR and come on up?" "There arent any left," Lt Ross yelled up angrily. "Then get the hell under cover," Warden yelled down as he looked up. "Here they come." Lt Ross dived under the porch for the supplyroom as another single came blasting in from the southeast and the roaring umbrella of fire rose from the roofs to engulf it. It seemed impossible that he could fly right through it and come out untouched. But he did. Right behind him, but flying due north along Waianae Avenue and the Hq Building, came another plane; and the umbrella swung that way without even letting go of its triggers. The plane's gastank exploded immediately into flames that engulfed the whole cockpit and the plane veered off down on the right wing, still going at top speed. As the belly and left under-wing came up into view, the blue circle with the white star in it showed plainly in the bright sunlight. Then it was gone, off down through some trees that sheared off the wings, and the fuselage, still going at top speed, exploded into some unlucky married officer's house quarters with everyone watching it. "That was one of ours!" Reedy Treadwell said in a small still voice. "That was an American plane!" "Tough," Warden said, without stopping firing at the new double coming in from the northeast. "The son of a bitch dint have no business there." After the Jap double had flashed past, unscathed, Warden turned back and made another circuit up and down the roof, his eyes screwed up into that strained look of having been slapped in the face that he sometimes got, and that made a man not want to look at him. "Be careful, you guys." he said. Up the roof. Down the roof. "That last one was one of ours. Try and be careful. Try and get a look at them before you shoot. Them stupid bastards from Wheeler liable to fly right over here. So try and be careful after this." Up the roof. Down the roof. The same strained squint was in his voice as was in his eyes. "Sergeant Warden!" Lt Ross roared up from down below. "God damn it! Sergeant Warden!" He ran back to the roof edge. "What now?" "I want you down here, god damn it!" Lt Ross yelled up. He had his belt buckled and his shoes tied now and was smoothing back his hair with his fingers under his cap. "I want you to help me get this orderly room ready to move out! You have no business up there! Come down!" "Goddam it, I'm busy!" Warden yelled. "Get Rosenberry. Theres a goddam war on, Lieutenant." "I've just come from Col Delbert," Lt Ross yelled up. "And he has given orders we're to move out as soon as this aerial attack is over." "G Compny's ready to move now," Warden yelled down. "And I'm busy. Tell that goddam Henderson to send up some clips and belts." Lt Ross ran back under the porch and then ran back out again. This time he had a helmet on. "I told him," he yelled up. "And tell Stark to send us up some coffee." "God damn it\" Lt Ross raged up at him. "What is this? a Company picnic? Come down here, Sergeant! I want you! Thats an order! Come down here immediately! You hear me? thats an order! All Company Commanders have orders from Col Delbert personally to get ready to move out within the hour!" "Whats that?" Warden yelled. "I cant hear you." "I said, we're moving out within the hour." "What?" Warden yelled. "What? Look out," he yelled; "here they come again!" Lt Ross dove for the supplyroom and the two ammo carriers ducked their heads back down through the hatch. Warden ran crouching back to Pete's chimney and rested his BAR on the corner and fired a burst at the V of three that flashed past. "Get that goddam ammo up here!" be roared at them in the hatchway. "Milt!" Chief Choate yelled. "Milt Warden! They want you downstairs." "You cant find me," Warden yelled. "I've gone someplace else." Chief nodded and relayed it down over the edge. "I cant find him, Lootenant. He's gone off someplace else." He listened dutifully down over the edge and then turned back to Warden. "Lt Ross says tell you we're moving out within the hour," he yelled. "You cant find me," Warden yelled. "Here they come!" Grenelli yelled from the tripod. They did not move out within the hour. It was almost another hour before the attack was all over. And they did not move out until early afternoon three and a half hours after the attack was over. G Company was ready, but it was the only company in the Regiment that was. Warden stayed up on the roof, by one subterfuge or another, until the attack was over. Lt Ross, it turned out, stayed down in the supplyroom and helped load ammunition. The Regimental fire umbrella claimed one more positive, and two possibles that might have been hit by the 27th and already going down when they passed over the quad. Stark himself, personally, with two of the KPs, brought them up coffee once, and then still later brought up coffee and sandwiches. In gratitude for which, Pete Karelsen let him take over the MG for a while. After it was all over, and the dead silence which no sound seemed able to pentrate reigned, they all smoked a last cigarette up on the roof and then, dirty-faced, red-eyed, tired happy and let-down, they trooped down reluctantly into the new pandemonium that was just beginning below and went to roll their full field packs. Nobody had even been scratched. But they could not seem to get outside of the ear-ringing dead silence. Even the pandemonium of moving out could not penetrate it. Warden, instead of rolling his pack, went straight to the orderly room. In the three and a half hours before they finally left he was in the orderly room all the time, getting it packed up. Lt Ross, whose Company was the only one that was ready ahead of time, had already forgotten to be angry and came in and helped him. So did Rosenberry. Warden had plenty of time and to spare, to pack the orderly room. But he did not have any time left to roll his full field pack or change into a field uniform. Or, if he did, he forgot it. The result of this was that he had to sleep in the popcorn vender's wagon at Hanauma Bay without blankets for five days before he could get back up to Schofield to get his stuff, and he would have welcomed even a woolen OD field-uniform shirt. He did not see how the hell he could have possibly have forgotten that. One by one, each company's consignment of trucks lined up before its barracks in a double file and settled down to wait. One by one, the platoons of troops filed out into their company yards and sat down on their packs holding their rifles and looked at the waiting trucks. The Regiment moved as a unit. No two companies were going to the same place. And when they got there each company would be a separate unit on its own. But one company, that was ready, did not leave out by itself for its beach positions ahead of the other companies, that were not ready. The Regiment moved as a unit. Everywhere trucks. Everywhere troops sitting on their packs. The quad filled up with trucks until even the