The Ninth Wave (23 page)

The ship lurched and the three men on the table slid sideways. Martin and
the two corpsmen stopped working and pulled the men back into position.
"And the captain has to go fight some Japs in the midst of all this,"
Martin said through his cigar. "He's already killed two men by the crazy
way he jerks this ship around. See that corpsman over there," he said
and pointed at the youngest corpsman. "He's already done four operations
tonight that should only be done by a doctor and a specialist and they
all came off all right, but once the ship lurched and he put a scalpel
through an aorta."
Mike saw the morphine syrettes and picked one up. He picked off the
plastic cap, pushed the plunger. A white liquid oozed from the needle. He
walked over to the man the two seamen had brought in. He jabbed the needle
into the man's arm and squeezed the tube of morphine empty. He picked up a
blanket and wrapped it around the man. The man was stony cold and stiff,
but his tongue worked in his mouth, sending saliva out between his lips,
and his eyes followed Mike.
Mike worked for a half hour and then, suddenly, they were through with
the worst cases. Martin began to walk around the room and check over
the patients.
Mike walked over to the corner where the legs were sticking out from
the blankets. He lifted up one edge. The boy with the burnt hand and the
chief were there. The boy's hand, pink and delicate looking, was placed
on his chest. Beside him the huge distended body of the chief was stiff.
Mike looked up and caught Martin's eye.
"Both dead?" he asked.
"Dead as doornails," Martin said. "The boy of burns, the chief of shock
and, maybe, heart failure. When they came walking in here I knew they
didn't have a chance."
Mike dropped the edge of the blanket.
He left the wardroom and went out on deck. In a few minutes his eyes
adjusted and he could see the long line of the island, the black shape of
ships. He looked around and saw the big round slick from the transport,
glittering on the water.
How could the two of them die so easily, he thought? Could I have died
so easily?
He felt no fear because he might have died. But, suddenly, he felt a
terrible anxiety. It ripped at him like a gnawing animal in his guts. It
was so sudden, so intense, that he could not phrase the feeling. His
fingers tightened on the railing.
What if I died before I knew anything for sure? he thought. What if I
died before I knew about me . . . and all of them? His hand moved and
took in all the world outside himself. What if I died and never knew
what it was all about? Never knew if I was right about a single thing?
The words did not drive the anxiety down; it stayed there relentless and
hard. He was sure that it did not come from a fear of his own death. But
because he could not understand it, could not master it, he told himself
that this was why he was afraid. It was a thin comfort, but a comfort
But the gnaw was still there.
They gave Mike a Silver Star in Nouméa. An admiral came out from COMSOPAC
and pinned the medal on his chest. The crew was drawn up at attention,
flags were flying and sea gulls whirled in the air. As the admiral read
the citation Mike was astounded to see tears in the old man's eyes.
"You did a very fine thing, young man," he said in a husky voice. "Staying
in the water to recover bodies was especially outstanding. Sharks, burning
oil, enemy submarine. Real courage, young man, and a high regard for your
fellow man."
Mike started to say something for he was startled by the words. But he
realized it Was hopeless. He saluted.
CHAPTER 14
"No Rust of Superstition"
The spire of the cathedral of Nouméa holds its black cross against the
tropical sky with a stony arrogance. The cathedral is built of huge
yellow sandstone blocks. The blocks are rough and uneven from the
picks and chisels of the quarrymen. The soft stone absorbs water out
of the ground and during the rainy season the moisture line creeps up,
black and wet, as high as one's eye. But as one looks up the side of
the cathedral, the surface seems to change. The gouges in the blocks
become invisible, the cement disappears and the stone starts to flatten
out and look machined, rubbed, almost polished. Finally the upper spire
becomes a slippery golden spike of stone, thinning to a point and then
suddenly breaking out into the sharp angles of the cross.
The only break in the stone of the cathedral is the patinaed windows of
colored glass, which are punched through the thick walls at irregular
intervals. The windows of the cathedral look north toward the tree-covered
hills of New Caledonia. To the south they face the deep blue water of
the South Pacific where a long jagged reef is decorated with the hulks
of ships, and a tall lighthouse, striped like a barbers pole, marks the
entrance to the passage. The windows gaze out like dull medieval eyes,
disapproving of the blue sea, the yellow hot sky, the piled up green
richness of the jungle. For all but a few minutes of the day, the windows
stare out with a calm flatness. However, in the early morning the rays
of the sun are flat and cool and penetrate the stone sockets. For a few
restless seconds the windows flash brilliant stabs of light. The sun
pushes higher into the sky and the windows again become dull eyes, the
cathedral is once more made of wet, bruised, cheap blocks of sandstone
carelessly put together.
Mike was leaning against the stone wall that surrounded the courtyard,
his head bent back, trying to look up the side of the cathedral. When
he threw his head back he brought his hand to his naval officer's cap;
deliberate and unnecessary for the cap clung tightly to his head. He
spread his legs out carefully and braced himself solidly against the
stone wall.
With his head bent back, the spire of the cathedral seemed to be expanding
away into the sky, pushing the sharp angles of the cross into the thin
blueness so that it became smaller as he looked. His Adam's apple pressed
tightly against the taut skin of his throat and he could feel the stone
wall irritating his back. Reluctantly, he brought his head down and stared
at the dark water line on the side of the church. The expanding spire
tore the church out of proportion, drawing it thin and tall, and it was
a pleasant sensation. It was as if he were standing still and very stable
and the church was being distorted and changed in front of his eyes.
Mike muttered, "I oughta go in and pay a visit. Even if I'm not a
Catholic. But I'm scared."
He looked at the black hole of the door and could smell a faint inviting
odor made up of burnt candles, incense, old books, perfume, and sweat. He
licked his lips and looked away.
In a minute, he said to himself, in a minute I'll go in.
He turned, and with his hands braced against the wall looked down at the
town of Nouméa spread out below the cathedral. Far down to the right,
almost alongside the harbor, he could see the Hotel Pacifique which had
been turned into an officer's club. Even from here, almost a quarter
of a mile, he could hear the voices singing, confused and tattered, and
without identifying the tune he knew they were singing "Bless 'Em All." In
some part of his mind he could see them clearly, standing in circles with
sweat pouring from their bodies and making big circles of dark moisture
underneath their arms and eating wetly into their caps. They would sing
for hours, their voices getting hoarser until the song was a rasping
caricature, each man singing whatever he wanted and the circle swaying
dangerously as the officers got drunker. Then when it was dark and the
bar closed, they would stagger out into the streets of Nouméa, looking
for women. Still singing wisps of the song, but driven by something more
urgent than alcohol or camaraderie, so that they finally gave up the
pretense of singing and cursed and made fevered plans. The alcohol and
the desire would run out at the same time and finally they would all end
up at the Fleet Landing, waiting with red eyes and pounding headaches
for their boats. They would stand silently, the whisky-smelling sweat
drying on their backs, like sad bulls. Occasionally they would look at
one another with shy embarrassed glances.
Not me, not tonight, Mike said to himself. No more hunting around for
those Javanese women in the villages outside of town. Not me.
He turned around and looked at the cathedral, gazed for a moment at
the black inviting maw of the entrance and then quickly turned away,
thinking again of the last visit to the Javanese village. He looked
almost straight into the sun and the blinding light burst against his
eyeballs and somehow jogged his memory loose, so that the recollection
was very strong and clear, a spinning black dot of memory in the midst
of a sunburst of brilliance . . .
. . . six of them had left the club drunk, and piled into a jeep.
"The pussy is located in the Javanese villages," Jack Brannon said in
his high, shrill southern voice. "I have researched and discovered that
pussy is found there in fine and great quantities. Two miles out toward
Anse Vata, turn left, stop by a clump of coconut trees. Gentlemen,
let us proceed."
The Javanese village was built of tiny wooden shacks made out of old
K-ration cases that were roofed over with flattened tin cans. A stink,
strong as acid, rose from the ground. Small ageless men sat on their
heels in front of the houses, watching with almond eyes as the American
officers came down the street, stumbling and laughing.
Brannon knew where to go and he took them to the largest shack at
the end of the street and swept them into the room with a gesture of
southern gallantry.
"Bring on the girls," he called and his voice was slightly hoarse,
the shrill edge gone. "My friends want entertainment. Where is the
pussy?" Brannon giggled.
From behind a burlap curtain at the back of the shack an old woman peered
out. She grinned at them with black teeth. In a few minutes she pushed
a young girl out of the door.
The girl was small, even for a Javanese, but she walked with oil-packed
hips and wore a tightly wrapped skirt and a jacket. Doll-like she stared
at them for a moment and then took off her jacket so that they could
see her perfect small breasts with faintly pink nipples. She smiled and
there was a look of idiot concupiscence on her face; a sort of infantile
lust. She began to move her hands in an elaborate dance; the fingers
spread far apart, the wrists twisting rigidly, the long arms slowly
weaving back and forth in front of her body. Her knees bent sharply and
she shuffled woodenly sideways. The stiff ritual movements of the dance
seemed to emphasize the overripe richness of her body, the provocative
roundness of her hips, the softness of her breasts. From behind her
fingers she smiled at them.
They stared at her, hardly watching the delicate unfolding of the dance,
but only aware of the perfection of the tiny body, the strange impression
of wantonness about the girl.
"Old lady, where is the rest of the pussy?" Brannon roared. "We want
more women."
The other men did not take their eyes from the girl. The old woman
stuck her head out the door and signaled that there was only one girl
that night.
Like a wave, the six men moved toward the girl, grabbing for her. She
continued to dance until the first man reached her, a grin of delight
on her soft full face. They all reached her at once and forgot they were
friends, and began to fight and knee and kick at one another, struggling
to get the girl first.
"God damn," the old woman said. "One at a time. Just one at a time. All
possible."
They shivered and stopped fighting and stood still; breathing through
their nostrils; their eyes red. And they waited their turn listening to
the girl's rich throaty laugh roll out from the back room . . .
. . . not tonight, Mike said aloud. Reluctantly he pushed himself around
and looked again at the cathedral.
"I oughta go in," he said aloud. "I'll feel better if I do. Later I'll
feel much better about it."
He licked his lips again, shuffled his feet. He stared again at the
entrance, anxious about what was inside.
He started to walk toward the cathedral door and suddenly a priest was
standing in the door, looking out. Mike remembered in sudden confusion
that there was something you had to do when you passed a Catholic
priest. He did not know what it was and wondered desperately what his
Catholic triends would do in such a situation.
Mike was confused by the priest and turned away, afraid again to go
in the cathedral. He wondered dully why he had ever come up the hill;
what had led him on such a God-damned silly chase. Then he remembered
that he had seen the spire of the cathedral from the officer's club in
the Hotel Pacifique. He had been listening to a Marine major talk and
he could see the glistening spire, thin, delicate, sharp against the
sky. He had stared at it as the Marine talked and in his mind's eye had
filled in the unseen shape of the cathedral
Mike thought again of the major's story. The major's face slid across
his mind, blurring his vision . . .
. . . his face was incredibly young with a mustache of coarse blond hairs
and eyes that were a little watery from whiskey. He talked in an eager,
flat voice.
"Jesus knows how long they'd been pushing through the jungle like that,
but it must have been at least two days, ever since the fight around the
Tenaru. My patrol turned them up and we followed the two of 'em for an
hour just to see what would happen to them.
"This little dinky Jap bastard was carrying the big one in his arms. I
could see right away that the big one was wounded in the legs because his
feet were hanging over the little guy's arms and one of his shoes pointed
up in the air and the other pointed straight into the ground. Yeah, and
I guess they were bleeding a little, just a few drops off the toe that
was toward the ground. But we couldn't figure out what was wrong with
the little Jappo. Every once in a while the little guy would stumble and
the two Nips would fall down. The big guy would start to call directions
to him in Japanese and the little runt would crawl around feeling with
his hands for the big one."