From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [235]
There was a streetlight a few feet past the bench. He could tell it was Angelo. He relaxed.
“Goddam you, Maggio,” he said.
His own voice sounded eerie. The figure did not move the outstretched arms along the benchtop or the thick curly head that lolled back against it.
“Is that you, Angelo? Wake up, goddam you. Answer me, you fuckin bastard.”
The figure did not move. He stopped in front of the bench and stood looking down at Maggio, grinning suddenly, feeling the still night around them, feeling suddenly the presence of richness and wealth and ease that seeped through the screen of bushes from the Royal Hawaiian Hotel.
This is where the movie stars stay when they come to Hawaii to rest and play. All the movie stars. Wouldnt it be nice, he thought. He had never been inside the screen but he had walked past the Royal on the beach and seen them on the patio. But wouldnt it be nice, he thought, if a movie star would come out right now and see me here and ask me back inside, up to her room. Maybe she’s just been for a midnight swim and the water droplets still on her and just taking the bathing cap off the long falling hair, her arms up to her chin. Dorothy Lamour, maybe. He had seen her once, at a distance, when she visited Schofield. She was in some big brass’s car. They gave her the key to the city and made her a mascot, of some outfit or other. Or Lana Turner maybe, with the stupid face and the knockers like a big round dish of cream. Or maybe Rita Hayworth. They all of them stayed here. Maybe some of them were even here now, and they all looked so hot on the screen, hot as hell.
He looked up from Maggio suddenly, looking toward the darkened driveway where a faint light showed inside, thinking surely he would see this woman walking out, knowing it positively, her coming looking for a man and finding him available. They said these did it like that all the time. Suddenly there was a very large ache inside his belly, almost like a cramp and he thought about Lorene at the New Congress. He stood looking at the empty driveway. What a way to make a living.
“Hey, come on. Wake up, you dago bastard. Wake up and lets go down town and get a piece of ass.”
“I’m sorry, Sir,” Angelo said, not opening his eyes or moving. “I wont do it again. Just dont lock me up, Sir. Just dont make me re-enlist. Honest I wont.”
Prew leaned down and shook him by the naked bony shoulder. “Come on, wake up.”
“I’m awake. Its just that I dont feel like moving. I just dont feel like going back.”
“We got to go back.”
“I know it. But maybe if we was to sit here long enough some movie star will come out from there and pick us up and take us back to the States in her private plane and install us in her private swimming pool. You suppose? Maybe if we was to just sit here real still and dont move none except to breathe and dont open your eyes, when we open our eyes it wont be here. None of it, no street, no bench, no pass, no Reveille.”
“Jesus Christ!” Prew snorted. “Movie stars, no less. My god you are drunk. Come on. Wake up. I got your clothes.”
“I dont want clothes,” Angelo said.
“I got em anyway.”
“Well, give em back to the Indians. The Indians need clothes. All they wear is codpieces. Did I hear you say piece of ass?” Angelo opened his eyes and turned his head to look the question.
“Sure. I made your boyfriend for forty bucks. He was scared you’d get picked up and come back bringin the law with you. Sent me out to find you and take you home.”
“Hell,” Angelo said. He sat up and rubbed his hands hard against his face. “I aint drunk, friend.” He paused. “Hell, man, you dont need no instruction from me, buddy. The very most I ever got out of him was twenty-two-fifty. And then I was suppose to pay it back. I aint though.”
Prew laughed. “I couldna got it if he