Battle Cry - Leon Uris [111]
“Why bless yo’ cotton-picking ass, Speedy.”
“No sass, Yankee, or you and me is going to the deck…. We’ll snap assholes for fair.”
“Have another beer and don’t talk so much.”
“You’re a hell of a nice guy, L.Q.”
Shining Lighttower began a slow sway on his cot. Ordinarily a man of calm habit, as sweet and gentle an individual as you’d care to meet, he was a human dynamo when crocked. Luckily, he usually gave us a minute’s advance warning by swaying and mumbling some ancient Indian chants. Then all hell would break loose. Andy spotted him first.
“The Injun is winding up.” Lighttower’s chant became louder.
“Oh-oh.” The squad backed away toward the tent flap.
“We can’t jump ship with Mary out cold there. That red-man will have his scalp for sure—besides, he’s liable to bust some beer bottles.”
“I got it, let’s tie the Injun up on his sack.”
“A good idea, there’s some rope in my pack.”
“Hurry, get it.”
We fidgeted as Lighttower lifted his head and cast bleary eyes in our direction.
“Andy,” Danny ordered, “you go up and coldcock him.”
“Like hell, I seen him drunk before.”
“Chicken?”
“Yep.”
“Oh, well, that makes two of us.”
L.Q., who was a little drunker than the rest of us, came up with a foolhardy plan.
“I’ll attract his attention. Danny, you’re a football player. You tackle him from the rear. Speedy, have that rope ready.”
“Good idea,” said Seabags, who was omitted from the plan.
We shoved L.Q. to the center of the tent before he could change his mind. He looked at the Injun, then turned and shook each our hands.
“Semper Fidelis,” Seabags said. “You’ll get the Navy Cross for this, L.Q.”
He gritted his teeth and advanced. “On your feet, Injun!” Lighttower sprung up and shrieked like his ancestors as they headed away from a powwow into battle. Danny ran across the deck and took a flying leap. He missed the Indian completely and tackled L.Q. and the pair went flying into a sack, smashing it to smithereens.
“Ya damned fool, you tackled the wrong one,” Seabags cried, as Lighttower came out on the warpath full blast after them.
“Quick,” Andy yelled, “the rope…the rope!”
Speedy cut Andy short by slipping the rope over him and yanking him to the deck. “Not me, not me, get that Injun!”
Lighttower came at me. He howled like a coyote. He sensed the blood of a white man; he was going to avenge the tribe. This called for quick action. I reached down and quickly grabbed a bottle.
“Have a beer,” I said.
“Gee, thanks, Mac,” the Injun said. He uncapped it and raised it to his lips. By this time, the commandos had untangled and jumped him en masse. The one mouthful of beer he had taken was sprayed all over me. After fifteen minutes of powerful hand-to-hand combat we had him lashed to his bunk. We turned his head, the only movable part of his body, and placed a bottle of beer between his lips.
“When you finish, just sing, old pal,” Andy said.
Lighttower smiled and thanked us for our consideration and gurgled away, snug in his bonds.
Next Burnside stumbled into the tent, roaring, “I beat McQuade! Ya hear! I whipped that candy-assed gyrene twenty-eight bottles to twenty-three….” We lifted him carefully from where he had dropped and threw him on his sack.
“Ya know somepin’, men,” I said, “this is the finest outfit in the Corps. You boys are just like my own kids…seeeee!”
“You are my sunshine, my only sunshine,” the Injun sang.
“Andy, give Lighttower another bottle of beer, he’s singing.”
“We oughta land right on Truk with this outfit, right in the middle of the Imperial Fleet.”
“Or Wake.”
“Or Frisco.”
“Get me another bottle.”
“Too right for a bloody quid, matey.”
“You guys know something?” L.Q. stuttered. “We ought to stick together, even after we win the war.”
“Yeah, we oughta stick together.”
“I agree.”
“Let’s make a pact to meet after the war.”
“How about it, Mac?”
“Sure.”
“Let’s put it in writing, L.Q., and the man who breaks the pact is a dirty bastard.”
“Yeah.”
“How about you, Mac?”
“Count me in, even if I got to go over the hill to meet you.” L.Q. took a piece