From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [428]
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 air-cooled .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 aro