The Naked and the Dead - Norman Mailer [119]
Dalleson frowned. "Aw hell, it'll be good enough."
"Well, I'll tell you, Major, I'll be frank about it" -- Leach's voice was soft with a southern accent -- "I'd like to oblige you but I only have but three pictures left, and it's kinda hard to get film."
"I'll pay you for it," Dalleson offered.
"Aw, no, I wasn't thinking of that, but, well, you see --"
Dalleson interrupted him. "Come on, man, all I'm asking you for is a picture. What the hell are you gonna shoot it up of, except some of these other Joes around here?"
"All right, Major."
Dalleson beamed. "Okay, now look, Leach, what I want is for you to get out on that spit a little bit, and I want you to get me in, of course, and the jungle in back so my friends'll know where the hell it was taken, and also I want you to get that pebble when it busts in the air."
Leach looked distressed. "Major, you can't get all that in. That would include a ninety-degree arc, and the angle of lens of this camera isn't more than thirty-five degrees."
"Well, look, man, don't give me all those goddam facts and figures. It seems to me it ain't that goddam hard to take a little picture."
"I might be able to take you from the back with you in the foreground and tilt the camera up so it catches the pebble, but I'll tell you, Major, it's just a waste of film because that pebble isn't even gonna register. It's too small."
"Leach, it ain't that complicated. I've taken pictures. All you got to do is press a damn button. Now let's cut out all this jawing."
Obviously miserable, Leach squatted behind Dalleson and hopped around for a few seconds trying to find the proper angle. "Will you throw a practice pebble up, Major?" Leach asked. Dalleson flipped one in the air. "Let's get these dry runs over," he grumbled.
"All right, I'm ready now, Major."
Dalleson bent over, straightened, and fired at the pebble when it was at the top of the parabola. He missed, and turned around to Leach. "Let's try another one."
"All right," Leach said grudgingly.
This time Dalleson hit the pebble, but Leach had reacted too late, and he snapped the shutter after the pebble fragments were dispersed. "Goddammit, man!" Dalleson roared.
"I'm doing my best, Major."
"Well, let's not drop the ball next time." Dalleson threw away the pebbles in his hand and searched for a larger one.
"This's the last picture in the roll, Major."
"Hell, we'll make it." Dalleson wiped the sweat out of his eyes again, bent over, and stared at his knees. His heart was beating a little rapidly. "You snap it soon's you hear the carbine go off," he growled.
"Yes, sir."
Up went the pebble and his rifle pointing after it. There was a panicky instant when he couldn't locate it in his sights, and then as it started to fall he caught it over the front-leaf sight, adjusted instinctively, and felt the reassuring minor jolt of the stock, the slight kick, as he pressed the trigger.
"I got it that time, Major."
Ripples on the water were still spreading from the fragments of the pebble. "Goddam," Dalleson said again with enjoyment. "I appreciate this, Leach."
"That's okay, sir."
"Lemme pay you for it."
"Well. . ."
"I insist," Dalleson said. He slipped the magazine out of the carbine, and fired the round remaining in the chamber into the air. "Let's call it a quarter for the three pictures. I sure hope they come out good." He patted Leach on the back. "C'mon, son, let's you and me go for a swim. Hell, we deserve it."
This was all right.
9
Recon began working on the road again after they returned from the front. The line companies advanced their positions several times and the men in the rear heard rumors that they were close to the Toyaku Line. Actually they knew very little about what was happening in the campaign; the days repeated themselves without incident, and they were no longer able to distinguish between things which had happened a few days before. They would stand guard at night, awaken a half hour after dawn, eat breakfast, wash their mess kits, shave, and load onto trucks which drove them through the jungle to the stretch of road upon which they were working. They would return at noon, go out again after chow, and work until late afternoon when they would come back for supper, take a bath perhaps in the stream just outside the bivouac, and then go to sleep soon after dark. They had about an hour and a half of guard each night, and they were thoroughly accustomed to it; they had forgotten what it was like to sleep for eight consecutive hours. The rainy season had come on and they were always wet. After a time it was no longer a discomfort. The dampness of their clothing seemed perfectly natural to them, and it was very difficult to remember just what it had felt like to wear a dry uniform.