From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [39]
“What the hell you think?” part of Anderson’s indignant protest came through the open door. “The best goddam bugler in the Regiment for Chrisake!”
“Yeah, but he wouldnt . . .” Clark said perplexedly; the rest was only a mumble as they passed beyond the door.
Prewitt dropped his cards and threw the cigaret to the floor. He moved swiftly and caught them on the stairs.
“Come back here,” he said.
Anderson’s head, amputated by the floor level, turned to face him with consternation, a balloon in suspension. The ominous insistence made his legs carry him back up the stairs before his mind had decided what to do. Clark tagged reluctantly along after his mental guide, without choice.
Prewitt wasted no time on preliminaries. “I dont want your goddamned job,” he said in a low white voice. “If I’d wanted to bugle I’d of stayed right where I was. Its a cinch I wouldnt come here and cut you out of your stinkin little job.”
Anderson shifted his feet evasively. “Well,” he said uneasily, without meeting Prewitt’s eyes, “you’re good enough you could get my job any time you wanted.”
“I know it,” Prewitt said. A white wall of anger descended over his eyes like the polar icecap descending over the globe. “But I never check a cinch into nobody—outside of a game. I dont play that way, see? If I wanted the goddam job, I wouldnt sneak in here and cutthroat you out of it.”
“Okay,” Anderson said placatingly. “Okay, Prew. Take it easy.”
“Dont call me Prew.”
Clark stood silently by, grinning embarrassedly, his soft eyes wide, looking from one to the other like the spectator at a wreck who watches a man bleed to death because he doesnt know what he should do and fears making a fool of himself.
Prewitt had meant to say that Holmes had offered him the job and he had turned it down, but some look in Anderson’s eyes touched his mind and made him hold it back.
“Nobody likes to do straight duty,” Anderson said lamely; you never could tell about a fireball like Prewitt. “I know I aint as good as you are when you played a Taps at Arlington. You could get my job easy, and it wouldnt be a square thing.” It ended up in the air as if unfinished.
“I dont want you to get down sick,” Prewitt said. “You can quit worrying about it now.”
“Well . . . thanks, Prew,” Anderson said painfully. “I dont want you to think I . . . I mean I didnt . . .”
“Go to hell,” Prewitt said. “And dont call me Prew. I’m Prewitt to you.” He turned on his heel and went back inside. He picked up his cigaret that was still burning on the cement floor and took a deep drag, listening to their slow steps on the stairs. With a sudden movement of bitterness he picked up some of the scattered cards and ripped them across. Then he threw them down on the bed. Unsatisfied, he picked up the rest of the deck and methodically tore each card in two. Might as well; they were no good now anyway. A hell of a fine start; as if he would try to rob them out of a stinking twobit job.
He pulled his mouthpiece out of his pocket and sat, hefting it in his hand, running his thumb over the cup. It was a fine mouthpiece; it was undoubtedly the best investment he ever made for thirty bucks of crap money.
He wished the weekend would hurry up and come, so he could get out of this screwedup rathole and go up to Haleiwa and see Violet. A lot of guys went around bragging about a shackjob here and a shackjob there. Very few of them were ever lucky enough to have one. They all talked about it, trying to convince each other and themselves of the wonderful women they had—and then they went down to the Service Rooms or the New Congress and had their ashes hauled at three dollars a throw. Prewitt knew how lucky he was to have Violet to shack up with him.
He sat on his bunk, angry and disgusted, waiting for chow, waiting for the weekend.
On the way to the PX Clark kept looking at Anderson