The Naked and the Dead - Norman Mailer [246]
"Aaah, balls, you yellow bastards, ducking down behind that rock."
"Fug you, Red."
Red slapped his forehead. "Jesus Christ, Wilson, of all the guys to be lost."
Gallagher wandered back and forth, smacking his hand against his forehead. "How the fug did we lose him?" he demanded. "Where is he?"
"Sit down, Gallagher," Stanley shouted.
"Blow it out."
"All you men can just shut your mouth," Croft snapped. "Pack of goddam women." He stood up and looked at them. "I'm gonna take a few men back to find Wilson. Who wants to go?" Red nodded, and Gallagher nodded his head in agreement.
The others were silent for a perceptible second or two. "Shoot, Ah might as well go," Ridges announced.
"I want one more man."
"I'll go," Brown said.
"I ain't taking any noncoms. The Lootenant'll be needing ya."
He looked around, staring at them. I shouldn't take any chances, Goldstein told himself. What'll Natalie do if something happens to me? But he felt a sense of guilt when everyone remained silent. "I'll go too," he said abruptly.
"All right. We'll jus' leave our packs in case we got to move fast."
They picked up their rifles, and filed out of the hollow, heading back toward the field where they had been ambushed. They moved silently, strung out in a long column, each man ten yards apart. The sun was moving toward the west, and it glared in their eyes. They were a little reluctant now.
They followed in reverse the route of their retreat, moving quickly without any attempt at concealment except when they crossed a ridge. The country was dotted with groves of bushes and trees, but they gave them only a cursory examination. Croft was certain Wilson had been wounded in the ambush, and hadn't left the field.
It took them less than half an hour to reach the ledge, and they advanced toward it stealthily, crouching close to the ground. There seemed no one about, no sound at all. Croft bellied forward over the rock slab, raised his head slowly, and searched the field. He could see nothing, and in the grove at the other end of the field, nothing seemed to be stirring.
"Goddam, goddam sonofabitching belly."
The men stiffened at the sound. Someone was moaning only ten or twenty yards away. "Goddam, ohhhhhhhh."
Croft stared into the grass. "Ohhhh, that mother-fuggin. . ." The voice trailed off in a babble of curses.
He slid down from the ledge, and joined the others, who waited for him nervously, their rifles unslung. "I think it's Wilson. Come on." He worked over to the left, slid up the broad flat slab of the ledge again, and dropped from it into the grass. In a few seconds he found Wilson, turned him over gently. "He's hit, all right." Croft stared at him with a mild pity, mixed with a trace of disgust. If a man gets wounded, it's his own goddam fault, Croft thought.
They knelt in the grass around him, careful to keep their heads low. Wilson had become unconscious again. "How're we going to get him back?" Goldstein asked in a whisper.
"Let me worry about that," Croft murmured coldly. He was concerned with something else for the moment. Wilson had been groaning loudly, and if the Japs were still in the grove they must have heard him. It was inconceivable that they wouldn't have come out to kill him, and therefore the only answer was that they had retreated. Their fire had been too sporadic, too small in volume, to have come from more than a squad of men. Undoubtedly it had been only an outpost with orders to retreat if any patrols were sighted.
Then the entrance to the pass was no longer guarded. He wondered if he should leave Wilson, and take the others with him on a reconnaissance. But it seemed pointless; there would certainly be more Japs deeper in the pass, and they would never get through. Their only chance was to go over the mountain. He stared up at it again, and the sight roused a delicate shiver of anticipation.
There was Wilson to be taken care of. It angered him. And he had to face something else. When the ambush had started, he had been paralyzed for a few seconds. It had not been fear, he had merely been unable to move. In remembering this he felt a little balked, almost teased, as if he had missed an opportunity. To do what. . .? He was uncertain, but the emotion was similar to the one he felt now because he could not reconnoiter the pass. There had been a gap before he fired, and in that. . . Something he had wanted. I fugged up, he told himself bitterly, not quite certain of what he meant.