Once an Eagle

  “It can wait.”

  From far up the road the whistles blew again, shrill and insistent. Damon got to his feet and called, “All right. Let’s go, let’s go …”

  The heat was worse now. His feet burned with every step and he could feel on the inside of his left heel the exquisite needle laceration of a blister starting. Dust coated their faces with its fine white powder and the sweat ran through it in little rivulets, giving them all a clownish, drunken look. They began to straggle; stumbling, falling back.

  “Close it up,” he shouted, “close it up, now …”

  By noon they had reached a broad paved highway, gutted with men and matériel, all heading north by east. The world was moving north by east, big guns and poilus and carts of ammunition. Under a grove of trees a detail of MPs were sprawled, eating out of cans.

  “Why, you look hungry, boys,” a big, black-haired man called to them, waving his arm with its black brassard. “You look as though you ain’t getting your three hots per. How about a nice bite of chow?”

  Little Turner cursed him savagely, but Raebyrne threw them his broadest grin and hollered, “Couldn’t chamber a morsel, Blackie, I’m full to here …”

  “You look it, Slim!”

  “Why, we been eating so heavy it keeps us skinny just carrying it around …”

  They pressed on, at that same driving pace, outstripped the artillery, the supply wagons; at one point Devlin dropped back and asked him anxiously: “Have they broken through again, Sam? The Germans?”

  “I don’t know,” he answered. “I doubt it.” He didn’t think they had—there would have been other, more ominous signs if that were the case. But then why such haste? Why were they being lashed along like this, day and night?

  The afternoon wore away in fitful exhaustion; the sun hung above their heads, sank behind them; and on they went. They marched doggedly now, like robots, with set faces and glazed eyes, limping on their blisters. Their canteens had been empty for hours. They no longer wondered How far?—they were too exhausted even to curse. But they kept on going, en masse, overtaking here and there supine figures from other platoons. They were even too weary to taunt anybody, but a few labored comments ran through the files; and Damon smiled, remembering their raging protest at the forced hikes in full marching order he’d put them through on the roads around Charmevillers. Twenty minutes later he pulled abreast of the second squad, and blinked in amazement: Dickey was wobbling perceptibly, his head rolling like a doll’s; Tsonka and Raebyrne had him under the arms, Turner had slung his rifle, Curtis was carrying his pack. Linked together they swayed and labored along, their heads sunk in their shoulders, striding in unison although there was no cadence. And Damon, trudging wearily beside them, felt the same hot rush of affection he’d known that night going up to the line above Brigny, under the flare—but now it was fused with a fierce, possessive pride: they knew the platoon was more than the mere sum of their numbers—they had imbued themselves with this knowledge and made it theirs. They were great, they were magnificent; he was proud to be their leader …

  They entered another wood now, a wilder, more somber forest; and finally, miraculously the word came down for a two-hour break. They broke ranks, stumbled off the road and sprawled under the fine old trees. Half of them fell asleep beside their rifles. Devlin located a pump near a shattered farmhouse and went with a detail to fill canteens. Damon moved among the drugged, recumbent figures.

  “Lieutenant, I can’t walk any further, I just know I can’t … ”

  “Why’s that, Mecklar?”

  “Look at that.” The boy raised his bare foot, where a blister the size of a half-dollar had swollen, the dead-white skin inflamed like some slick, loathsome growth around a moon of raw red flesh. “I can’t go on walking with that …”

  “My, that’s a fine one. Just like one I’ve got.”

  “You do?”

  “Hell, yes. Everybody’s got one. Let’s take a look at it.” Deftly he lanced it with his penknife, removed the dead skin and bandaged it with slow care, while Mecklar peered at him with frightened absorption. “There you go. Hang your socks from a tree branch for a little while before you put them back on, hear?”

  “You’d think they could have driven the trucks up a little farther than they did, wouldn’t you?” Brewster asked him.

  “Yes, you would, wouldn’t you?” He grinned. “But that’s the way they do things in the army, Tim. We know all about that, don’t we?”

  “I’m beginning to learn.”

  “That’s the pitch.” He exchanged a few words with Krazewski, turned back to say something to Brewster; but the boy was already asleep, his face on the back of his hand, his long dark lashes curled against his cheeks.

  It was dark when the word came to move out again, at the same frantic pace they’d kept up all day long. The right side and center of the road were choked with gun limbers and machine-gun teams, the mules’ heads bobbing with their loads. The platoon, crowded to single file on the left-hand side, plodded heavily on, their heads hanging, their bodies bent forward at that awkward, ducklike tilt a man falls into when he is burdened with a pack and half a hundred pounds of iron and steel and is weary unto death.

  The air became still and dense, like the air in a hothouse, and the outlines to all objects faded. To Devlin, marching at the rear of the column, they seemed to be walking off into some omnivorous and terrible void. Going toward the end, his mind kept repeating in a witless refrain of three strides. Going toward the end, the end, the end … Clay tried to drop out and he tongue-lashed him back into ranks. He hated Clay with a vengeance—the boy’s natural build and conventional good looks, his free-and-easy manner. Smart little rich boy, father owned half of Cleveland; wait till they went over … Then in the next instant he regretted that, pushed the thought away. His mind, disoriented by the onrushing darkness, the stifling heat, danced about capriciously among a patchwork of discordant images: the dawn sunlight streaming in the high windows of the mill back home, glinting on the stack calendars, the feed rolls, the belt housing, turning them all to burnished bronze and gold; little Turner at bayonet practice, stabbing at the dummies with comic savagery, cursing; Michele leaning down over him, her face very full, her eyes, framed by her straight dark hair, immensely large and tender. “I will pray for you, Jack,” she had murmured, her beautiful thin lips scarcely moving. “I do not believe in God anymore, I cannot, not after the hideous mockery of these four years—but I will pray for you nevertheless—” and her hair had streamed down around his face like the most delicate of curtains. “When He thinks of you even God should relent, a little …”

  There came a deep booming, a mountainous rumbling shudder that was poised directly above them, and involuntarily his shoulders contracted. Guns? Aerial bombardment? Then there was a taut, whiplike crack, and the column seemed to ripple throughout its length with apprehension, resolved an instant later when a great slash of lightning shot across the sky above them—a gnarled tree, inverted, darting crooked limbs of light—and the rain began, tapping on helmets and rifle stocks, then lashing down in seething waves; utter darkness swooped in around them. It was impossible, under the high, flailing canopy of branches, to see anything at all. He heard curses, a cry, and the sounds of men sliding and slipping in mud.

  “What’s the matter?” he shouted.

  There was a break in the file. Below him he heard the mutter of voices. There was a six-foot-deep ditch beside the road and someone had floundered down into it, followed by several others. “Come up!” he roared. He could hardly hear his own voice in the tumult of the storm. “Come on up here!” He reached down, caught hold of hands and rifles, hauled up a number of gasping, swearing shadows, got them moving again. “Close up, close up!” He moved close beside them, cupping his hand to his mouth to be heard. “Take hold of the pack of the man in front of you!” The rain lashed his face, shockingly cold. “Muzzles down! Your rifles muzzle-down!”

  They staggered on, slitheri
ng and floundering in the muck. The rain came in torrents, in streaming, sweeping waves and they bowed their heads to it. In the lightning bursts he could see them vividly—linked hand to shoulder, bent over absurdly, tramping along in a lunatic lock step, their helmets pushed forward over their eyes. The rain had meant a temporary relief from the intolerable heat, but it was short-lived; now, in place of roasting, they shivered and shook, their teeth chattering, soaked to the bone. The road had dissolved in an oozy slick that was worse than ice. At one point Turner led six of the file right off into the ditch again, in a cursing tangle of arms and legs and rifles. When Devlin got there they were groping their way up to the road, clutching at the grass with their fingers. One figure was still lying at the bottom, and Damon was bending over him.

  He called, “Who is it?”

  “Clay again,” Sam said flatly.

  “—I can’t make it, Lieutenant,” Clay was protesting. “I just can’t go any further …”

  “Of course you can.”

  “No, I can’t, I just can’t …”

  “God damn it, you can! If a hothouse kid like Brewster can make it, you can.”

  “Lieutenant, my leg—”

  “I’ll give you a hot-water bottle. You going to let the rest of them down? You’re no worse off than anyone else.” With a swift, impulsive motion Sam snatched up the other man’s rifle and slung it over his left shoulder. “Come on, now. Let’s go.”

  Clay said: “That’s my rifle—”

  “What do you want with it? You’re flaking out. And I thought you Buckeyes had guts …”

  Clay got to his feet and stood in front of the Lieutenant, swaying, his hands on his hips; his face, in the glow of Sam’s torch, was flat with hatred. “Give me my rifle,” he said tightly.

  “What makes you think—”

  “Give me my rifle!” In a lower voice he said, “I’ll walk anywhere you will and a mile farther, Damon.”

  Sam handed him back his rifle. “We’ll see about that. Now, let’s go.” He scrambled up the embankment and started off at what was almost a run. With an effort Devlin caught up to him and put his hand on his arm. “Sam—”

  Damon turned. “Yeah?”

  He paused. “Sam … this rain’s pretty bad …”

  “Best thing that could have happened.”

  Devlin gaped at him. “What?”

  “This storm. Couldn’t be better. They’ll never look for us tomorrow morning after this.”

  “Christ sake, it is tomorrow morning …”

  “That’s right. So it is.”

  There was no end to it. Rain beat into their eyes and mouths, soaked their packs and blankets, adding its weight to an already intolerable burden. Caissons slewed into them, mules plunged into them in the flashshot dark, braying and snorting. They drove themselves forward, each man’s hands on the pack ahead, like a procession of arthritic old men bent over in dumb anguish, their knees bent to a tottering shuffle. In the lightning flashes Devlin caught glimpses here and there of gigantic dumps of ammunition, piles of shells stacked like cord wood, the lumpy outlines of tanks, streaked with their crazy, angular camouflage of browns and blacks and grays. Everything shrank to the next hundred paces, the next twenty, the next five. At one point he became aware of a terrific clanging, clattering roar, and looked around in surprise to see a tank bulking beside him in a stench of gas and burning grease. He decided he must have been dozing off. This shook him and he redoubled his efforts to keep his attention on the column, but weariness overtook him again in a slow, sure billow. He was no longer conscious of suffering in his feet or back or shoulders; these separate pains had all merged in one vast, all-absorbing torment as proximate as the beating of one’s heart. His mind lost sequence again. Somewhere there was a field gun on the far side of the road, with a roan horse down and screaming; somewhere after that—or was it before?—there was a fallen tree, a great oak whose spiked leaves whipped his face as he swung by; and beyond it three soldiers from another company were clustered in the ditch around a man with a broken leg …

  The rain faded to a sodden, intermittent dripping, then stopped; and looking up he saw clouds—darker than dark—sliding away beyond them, leaving a few stars that faded off to infinity. To the east, ahead of them, the sky was slate with dawn. He gazed at his watch, began stolidly to wind it. Almost four. Almost four o’clock. But the thing that struck him was the silence. They had outstripped the tanks, the artillery, they were out ahead of everything, and around them the stillness was astonishing. Could they get away with it? a surprise assault on the tough old professionals who had all the answers, who never were surprised by anything? Oh God, if only they don’t know we’re coming, he breathed; if only they haven’t got wind of it …

  There was a fork in the road and Lieutenant Landry, the battalion adjutant, was standing there with a couple of runners, motioning them off to the side with his walking stick. “Five minutes to make up combat packs. You have five minutes. And hurry. There is not a minute to lose.”

  The platoon sprawled on their knees in the wet grass. They were fumbling like sleep-drugged children at clasps and slings, and watching them, Devlin’s heart misgave him. “Every man take his shovel or pick,” he told them. “Whatever else you forget, remember that.” He moved through them, repeating the order, and came on Damon, who had removed his Sam Browne belt and was buckling in its place a cartridge belt and extra bandoleers, like any infantryman. “I’ll wear it in camp because it’s regulations, but I’m damned if I’ll wear it in combat.” He dropped the shiny leather belt on the grass. “The boys know me by now—or if they don’t they’d better.”

  Devlin moved up close to him and said hesitantly, “Sam … ”

  “Yes?”

  “Sam … I’m not sure of them.” He opened his hand. “They’re awfully tired. They’re half out on their feet.”

  Damon stared at him. In the rushing dawn light the lines in his face looked like hard metal furrows; his eyes had bright little yellow points in them. “They’ll do it. We’ve got to do it.”

  “Sure, but without chow or even an hour’s sleep—”

  “I know. It can’t be helped. We must do it anyway.” He clapped the Sergeant on the shoulder once, lightly. “We’ll catch ’em with their pants down. You’ll see.”

  “Right, Sam.”

  The five minutes were gone. As though they’d never been. He heard whistles, and blew his own without thinking. The day was coming quickly now, hurrying toward them from the east, a sky flawless and irreproachable. They were slogging along again, bound in this strange stillness. Moisture dripped from the trees and plopped on packs and helmets. Now the ground was ripped and cratered with shell holes, the trees bore long saffron scars and splintered limbs; green branches were strewn across their path. Off to the left was a dense cluster of rubble, all that remained of some sleepy farm. They encountered tangles of barbed wire, and a shallow trench whose sides, reinforced by wattling, had broken down. It was half full of water. Beyond it stood a little group of officers, French and American. As they came up, Colonel Caldwell turned toward them.

  “Over that way,” Devlin heard him tell Sam. The Colonel’s eyes were swollen, his face was white with fatigue. “By the edge of those woods, see? Keep on to the right until you see the Moroccans. Keep going forward, and hug that barrage. Hug it! And good luck to you, all of you.”

  There was a murmured, indecipherable reply. They swung out in line of skirmishers, in good order. Devlin looked at his watch. 4:23. He turned and gazed at the platoon. They were wobbling and wavering as they walked. Their faces were ash gray and wan; they looked like sickly older brothers of the men he had trained.

  “All right,” Damon said. He had turned to face them, holding his Springfield across his thighs. His voice sounded harsh in the silence. “I’m not a great hand at speeches. You new men, remember your three-yard interval. If anybody gets hit, let him lie. You automatic riflemen, keep wide on the flanks wherever you can; and pour it
on. That’s what you’re there for, to let us get in close. Dev, I’m counting on you to make contact with the Senegalese as early as possible.”

  “Right, Sam,” he answered. His voice felt metallic, with none of the edges filed off. Sweat was working down through his eyebrows into his eyes.

  “Now, we’re going to go through,” Sam went on; his face looked hard, almost angry. “Don’t any of you make any mistake about that. What we go after, we get. Any man doesn’t do his duty here today has got a hell of a lot more than me to answer to. But I know you’ll do your duty, all of you. Because you’re good men. The best.”

  The ranks stood there doggedly, watching him. The silence was like great plates of glass bending.

  “Fix bayonets,” he ordered sharply. Their hands went smartly to their left thighs, the blades flashed in the light; and the click of the studs on the locking ring rippled along the line, dry and deadly in the stillness.

  “All right, let’s go,” Damon said, and swung on his heel.

  4:33. They were moving forward through the shattered wood. Turner seemed to jerk up and down with every step, as though his shoes had little wire coils. Ferguson was bent almost double and holding his rifle absurdly high, as if he were wading through a stream. Krazewski’s face was contorted in a snarl, his huge white teeth bared. No one spoke. This was going to take hours. Hours and hours, walking in this crazy silence. Devlin was conscious of the pressure of the helmet strap against his chin, the sweat stinging his eyes, and the stark, solid quaking of blood in his temples. His mind, a captive bird, shot away from the moment, saw Michele standing on the little balcony, her hands on the iron grillwork; she was laughing, her head back, her dark eyes dancing with delight. “Ah, to think I’d stopped believing in anyone like you. Wasn’t that foolish of me?” That quick, roguish look, her lovely lips quivering with mirth. “To turn so cynical? When there on the river bank, lying in all your naked glory, like a wild Irish king—”

  It came: a crash like the collision of a thousand locomotives, and the high-vaulted whisper and shriek of their arching—and then ahead of them, near, very near, the ragged, monstrous detonations of their fall. Smoke boiled upward and more and more shells passed over, the air above their heads singing with their terrible passage, and geysers of fiery red danced and darted through the screen of trees. He kept waiting for the answering barrage, but none came.