From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [24]
“They dont, Sir,” Prew said.
“I know,” Holmes said, much less warmly still. “What would you have us do? Disband our fighting program because one man got hurt?”
“No, Sir,” Prew said. “I didnt say . . .”
“You might as well,” Holmes said, “say stop war because one man got killed. Our fighting season is the best morale builder that we have off here away from home.”
“I dont want it disbanded, Sir,” Prew said, and then felt the absurdity to which he had been forced. “But I dont see,” he went on doggedly, “why any man should fight unless he wanted to.”
Holmes studied him with eyes that had grown curiously flat, and were growing flatter. “And that was why you left the 27th?”
“Yes, Sir. Because they tried to make me go on fighting.”
“I see.” Capt Holmes seemed all at once to have lost interest in this interview. He looked down at his watch, remembering suddenly he had a riding date with Major Thompson’s wife at 12:30. He stood up and picked up his hat from the IN file on his desk.
It was a fine hat, a soft expensive unblocked Stetson, with its brim bent up fore and aft, its four dents creased to a sharp point at the peak, and it bore the wide chinstrap of the Cavalry, instead of the thin strap authorized for the Infantry that went behind the head. Beside it lay his riding crop he always carried. He picked that up, too. He had not always been an Infantryman.
“Well,” he said, with very little interest, “theres nothing in the ARs that says a man must be a boxer if he doesnt want to. You’ll find that we wont put any pressure on you here, like they did in the 27th. I dont believe in that sort of thing. If you dont want to fight we dont want you on our squad.” He walked to the door and then turned back sharply.
“Why did you leave the Bugle Corps?”
“It was a personal matter, Sir,” Prew said, taking refuge in the taboo that says a man’s, even a private’s, personal matters are his own affair.
“But you were transferred at the Chief Bugler’s request,” Holmes told him. “What kind of trouble was it you were in, over there?”
“No, Sir,” Prew said. “No trouble. It was a personal matter,” he repeated.
“Oh,” Holmes said, “I see.” That it might be a personal matter he had not considered and he looked uneasily at Warden, not sure of how to approach this angle. But Warden, who had been following everything with interest, was suddenly staring unconcernedly at the wall. Holmes cleared his throat, but Warden did not get it.
“Have you anything you wish to add, Sergeant?” he had to ask him, finally.
“Who? me? Why, yes, Sir,” exploded Warden with that sudden violence. He was, quite suddenly, in a state of indignation. His brows hooked upward, two harriers ready to pounce upon the rabbit.
“What kind of rating you have in the Bugle Corps, Prewitt?”
“First and Fourth,” Prew said, looking at him steadily.
Warden looked at Holmes and raised his eyebrows eloquently.
“You mean,” he said, astounded, “you took a bust from First-Fourth to transfer to a rifle company as a buckass private, just because you like to hike?”
“I didnt have no trouble,” Prew said stolidly, “if thats what you mean.”
“Or,” Warden grinned, “was it just because you couldnt stand to bugle?”
“It was a personal matter,” Prew said.
“Thats up to the Compny Commander’s discretion to decide,” Warden corrected instantly. Holmes nodded. And Warden grinned at Prewitt velvetly. “Then you didnt transfer because Mr Houston made young Macintosh First Bugler? Over you?”
“I was transferred,” Prew said, staring at the other. “It was a personal matter.”
Warden leaned back in his chair and snorted softly. “What a helluva thing to transfer over. Kids in the Army we got now. Someday you punks will learn that good jobs dont grow on trees.”
In the electric antagonism that flashed between the two of them and hung heavy like ozone in the air Capt Holmes had been forgotten. He broke in now, as was his right.
“It looks to me,” he said indifferently, “as if you were fast acquiring a reputation as a bolshevik, Prewitt. Bolsheviks never get anywhere in the Army. You’ll find tha