The Naked and the Dead - Norman Mailer [204]
But, then, all the veterans did. It was simple to pick them out. There was Gallagher, who probably had always looked that way, but still he had been in the platoon for some time. And there was Martinez, who seemed more fragile, more sensitive than the others. His fine features had been nervous, his eyes had blinked as he talked to Hearn that morning. He was the one you would pick instantly to crack up, and yet he was probably a good man. A Mexican had to be to become a good noncom.
There was Wilson, and the one they called Red. Hearn watched Valsen. That one had a craggy face with a rough boiled look about it which emphasized the blueness of his eyes. His laugh had a hoarse sarcastic edge as if everything disgusted him exactly the way he had known it would disgust him. Valsen was the one who was probably worth talking to, and yet he would be unapproachable.
Collectively, they lent something to each other, seemed harder and meaner than they would if isolated. As they lay on their cots, their faces seemed the only things alive in the troop well. Their fatigues were old, faded to a pale green, and the boat walls had rusted brown. There was no color, no movement in anything but the flesh of their faces. Hearn threw his cigarette away.
On his left was the island, not more than half a mile across the water. The beach was narrow at this point and the coconut trees grew almost to the water's edge; behind them grew the brush, a dense tangle of roots and vines and plants, of trees and foliage. Inland there were hills, set heavily on the earth, their ridge-lines lost in the forests that covered them. Their lines were ugly, broken and scraggly, with bald patches of rock like the hide of a bison when it is shedding in summer. Hearn felt the weight and resistance of that land. If the terrain was similar at the place where they landed tomorrow, it would be hell working through it. Abruptly, the idea of the patrol seemed a little fantastic to him.
For a moment he became aware again of the steady grind of the assault craft's motors. Cummings had sent him out on this, and therefore he could distrust the mission of the patrol, distrust Cummings's motives in initiating it. It seemed a little inconceivable that Cummings should have made the mistake of transferring him; certainly the General must have known that this was what he preferred.
Was it remotely possible that the decision to transfer him had come from Dalleson? Hearn doubted it. With ease he could imagine the scene in which Cummings had given the idea to Dalleson. And the patrol was quite likely an extension of the General's motives in assigning him to recon.
But that seemed a little extravagant. He had discovered the hatred Cummings was capable of bearing, but he could not imagine Cummings expending a platoon for a week in order to work out a minor vengeance. There were other and easier ways; besides, Cummings was too much of a military craftsman to be wasteful. Consciously, he must have considered the patrol as an effective maneuver. What bothered Hearn was that the General might not be aware of his own motives.
Certainly, it seemed a little unbelievable that they could march for thirty or forty miles through unexplored jungle and hills, go through a mountain pass, scout the Japanese rear and return; the more carefully he considered it the more difficult it became. He was inexperienced, of course, and the mission might actually be easier to accomplish than he estimated, but at best it was a doubtful business.
It softened the edge of his satisfaction at being given a platoon. Whatever Cummings's reasons, there was no assignment Hearn preferred more. He foresaw the annoyances, the dangers, the inevitable disillusionments, but at least this was a positive action. For the first time in many months there were a few things he wanted again, simply and honestly. If he could manage it, if it turned out the way he wanted, he could establish some kind of liaison with the men. A good platoon.
It rather surprised him. It was a little too naïve, too ideal an attitude for himself. The moment it was established in another frame it became ridiculous. A good platoon. . . to do what, to work a little better in an institution he despised, whose ligaments Cummings had exposed to him? Or perhaps because it was his platoon, his baby? The private property concept. And he could detect elements of that in himself. Paternalism! The truth was, he grinned, he wasn't ready for Cummings's brand-new society in which everything was issued and never owned.