From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [57]
“Not Bloom,” Warden said.
“Why, yes,” Holmes said, satisfaction in his voice. “I’ve had my eye on him for quite a while. I keep my finger on the pulse of this Company much more than you think. Good athletes, I’ve found, always make the best soldiers,” he said maliciously. “Bloom won four of his fights in the Bowl this year. Its not impossible that we’ll make a Division Champion out of Bloom next year. Sgt Wilson is going to work with him.”
Holmes waited, looking at him, demanding an answer with his eyes. “You have Mazzioli do that tomorrow, will you?” he insisted gently, but firmly.
“Yes, Sir,” Warden said without looking up. “Yes-sir, I’ll do that.”
“Thanks,” Holmes said. He picked his pencil up triumphantly.
Warden finished up the papers, wondering if Holmes really believed the things he said or just said them for the effect; aware, as he handed the papers to Holmes, that he had just witnessed the beginning of the complicated mental process that had elevated over half the noncoms in the Company to their present rank.
Holmes looked the papers over with an air of profound well-being. “I suppose these are in good order?”
“Sir?” exploded Warden. “I make them out they’re always in good order.”
“Now, now, Sergeant,” Holmes said, raising his hand as if he were a bishop. “I know you’re a good first sergeant. I just want to be sure theres no slip on this transfer.”
“I made it out,” Warden told him.
“Yes,” Holmes smiled, “but your mind was too much on Leva and the supplyroom. If you’d quit worrying about Mess and Supply and trying to do their work in addition to your own, we’d have a lot more efficiency, and a much better outfit.”
“Somebody has to worry about it, Sir,” Warden said.
“Now, now,” Holmes laughed. “It cant be that bad, Sergeant. You look for things to worry about.
“Oh by the way, how is this new man Prewitt making out with straight duty now?”
“Doing fine. That boy is a good soldier.”
“I know he is,” Holmes said. “Thats what I’m counting on. I never saw a good soldier who liked to do straight duty as a private. I’m expecting to see him out for Company Smokers this summer. Theres an old saying that they tame lions in the Army.”
“I think you’re wrong,” Warden said bluntly. “I dont think you’ll ever see him out for boxing.”
“Wait until the rainy season’s over, Sergeant, before you be so sure. We’ve got a lot of field work coming up this summer.” He winked at Warden knowingly and picked up his rain-dark hat; at the moment he was sure, because Prewitt had been included in the plans of his campaign, and how could he not be on the squad if he was in the plans?
Warden watched him plowing his way back across the rain-swept deserted quad, realizing suddenly why he hated Holmes. It was because he had always feared him, not him personally, not his physique or mind, but what he stood for. Dynamite would make a good general someday, if he got the breaks. Good generals ran to a certain type, and Dynamite was it. Good generals had to have the type of mind that saw all men as masses, as numerical groups of Infantry, Artillery, and mortars that could be added and subtracted and understood on paper. They had to be able to see men as abstractions that they worked on paper with. They had to be like Blackjack Pershing who could be worried about the morality of his troops in France so much he tried to outlaw whorehouses to save their mothers heartache, but who was proud of them when they died in battle.
Through the obscuring mist of anger in him, the stark nakedness of the raindrenched earth and muddy grass and the lonely moving figure of Holmes huddled in his topcoat made a picture in his mind of a ghost town street and a strong wind rolling along a tattered scrap of paper in the gutter to some unforeseen and unimportant destination, moaning with the sadness of its duty. From upstairs he could hear the shouts and splashings of the Company washing up for chow, and the dullness that swept in through the open window made him shudder and put on his field jacket that hung on his chair.
He stared out the window, his rage disintegrated, replaced by an unutterable melancholy that had no reason he could find.
Leva’s ba