From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [266]
When Prew had them done he handed them around and they poured their coffee nervously in the screaming unbreakable silence that rose like mist from Stark. Then they tiptoed out gladly, like evacuees leaving the ominous stillness before a hurricane that is more frightening than any storm. Prew turned back at the flap to thank him. Stark did not move or look around.
“Men got to eat,” he said gravely, heavily, like an unbeliever trying to convince himself by taking an oath in church.
From the top of the embankment Hickam Field made a glow on the night sky. They were having night flying training every night and the hangars were lit up like empty theaters. Red and blue and green lights winked high overhead from the flying planes, and from around the hive that was the tower. Now and then a searchlight fingered the bellies of the clouds.
A hundred yards inside the road, the B 18s, ultimate and ungrateful purpose of all this regulated life that had been rolled out to give the problem realisticness, squatted like sullen birds in the nest of their revetments, looking like they resented being used as decoys for reality. Far down to the left they could just barely pick out Slade’s relief moving on the road.
“What you think of our mess sergeant?” Prew said, chewing and swallowing ravenously in the clear sharp still air. “I told you he was a good man.”
“He wasnt quite what I expected,” Slade said, cautiously.
“He runs that kitchen like a dictator,” Prew said.
“I could see that,” Slade said.
“Course, he had a couple drinks tonight,” Prew said.
“He didnt seem very happy,” Slade said charily.
“Happy?” Prew said. “He’s the happiest man I know.”
“How about Thousand Mile Blues?” Friday said, tuning the guitar. “While we wait for Andy.”
“I’ll buy that,” Slade said eagerly and relievedly. “I’m a blues man.”
“Then Andy’s your boy,” Friday said. “He’ll be here soon.”
The truck turned off its lights as soon as it turned in off the road, and then they could hear the low gear grinding in through the gap. A little cluster of lights formed around a central blackness, and all moved off bobbing toward the kitchen.
“I thought you said it was a blackout,” Slade said.
“Thats the lieutenant,” Prew said.
“Oh,” Slade said.
One of the lights came away from the tent, looking tiny and alone now by itself, and started up the path. It became Andy, carrying the other guitar.
“Was Stark in the kitchen?” Prew said.
“Yeah,” Andy said.
“Did he have a bottle?”
“Hell no. At least it wasnt showing. He was sound asleep. At least his eyes was shut.”
“He aint so drunk,” Prew said.
“Neither am I,” Andy said. “But look what I got.” He opened his shirt and pulled a bottle out of it.
“Hey,” Friday said. “Where’d you get it?”
“Oh, I got angles,” Andy said.
“Come on,” Prew said. “Where’d you get it?”
“I dint get it,” Andy grinned. “The Warden got hold of it some someplace. I bought it off of him. That sumbitch could find whiskey on a desert island. He come over with them in the truck, drunkern hell.”
“Dint the lieutenant say anything?”
“Hell, you know the lootenant never says nothing to The Warden. About nothing.”
“Who’s The Warden,” Slade said.
“The first sergeant,” Prew said. “Name’s Warden.” He introduced Slade to Andy and appropriated the bottle for the Air Corps man.
“Thats them now,” Andy said, pointing to the lights coming from the tent and starting off to make the rounds of the posts. “Theres only three. I guess The Warden aint with them.”
“Well, we got at least an hour yet,” Prew said.
“Gimme the pitch,” Andy said to Friday.
“Gimme the bottle,” Prew said to Andy. “Here, Slade. You want a nuther drink?”
“Christ,” Slade said happily. “Christ. You fellers really have the life.”