From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [465]
Perhaps it was only a mechanical thing caused by the going on of the spotlight, the instinctive move of the Kentuckian who, unlike the Infantryman, is used to being shot at by friends, but has an almost religious abhorrence of being shot in the back.
Anyway, he knew Harry’s Thompson gun was winking at him, as he turned around.
Standing there, in that couple of seconds, he could have fired twice with the .38 and killed two of them, Fred and the Cpl, standing there in the light of the headlights, they were perfect targets, but he did not shoot. He did not even want to shoot. He hardly even thought about shooting. They were the Army, too. And how could a man kill a soldier for just simply doing a sound competent job? It was still the rottenest word in the language. He had killed once. It did not do any good. Even though it was justified, and he did not regret it, it still did not do any good. Maybe it never did any good. The other still went right on. And if he could not kill the other, he would kill nothing. You could kill and kill and kill. He would not become a Disciple of the Word. And these were the Army, too. It was not true that all men killed the things they loved. What was true was that all things killed the men who loved them. Which, after all, was as it should be.
Three somethings rent their way agonizingly through his chest in echelon and he fell over backwards into the sandtrap and Harry’s Thompson gun ceased its short burst that had been going on for what seemed such a long time.
Well, I learned it, Jack. I learned it. The sandtrap was deep and the slope was steep and he had fallen on a downhill lie and had bounced over onto his face in the sand of the bottom. His chest hurt numbly, but it was not especially uncomfortable. But he could hear them coming up, and he did not want them to see him like this. Not facedown in the sand. His legs would not work, but using his elbows a little he managed to roll himself over downhillwards onto his back and to pull himself on down out onto the sand where it was level. Then he was done. Well, Jack, I learned it.
He would look better this way. And he could look up at them. I bet you never thought I’d learn it, did you, Jack?
“He just stopped,” Harry’s voice was saying, still shocked, as they came on up. “He just stopped. I wasnt firing at nothing special. I was just firing. Then the light went on. And he just stopped.”
He was glad he had been able to roll himself over and get down level onto the sand. And so this was it, this was the one. He remembered his mother lying on the cot. Well, you got something to shoot at there, kid. You always wondered just how it would come. You always thought it would somehow be special. What you couldnt imagine was how it would have this just everyday quality. Like taking a crap. Or getting your socks off. Or rolling a smoke. Just common, ordinary, every day. You sweated and sweated it out, and waited and waited on it, all your life you waited on it, and then finally it came, and all the time you had hoped you would be able to do it well, and then it came, and there it was, and now you would see if you would do it well. You did not guess it would be everyday, though. It would have been a lot easier to do well if it had been special. He felt glad when he saw their heads come over the rim of the sandtrap and watched them sliding down the slope. It would be a lot easier to do it well when you had an audience.
“Jesus,” the Cpl said. “Those Thompsons sure mess them up.”
“You know I didnt mean to shoot him,” Harry said. “He just stopped. It makes you feel pretty shitty.”
Thats what they call passive resistance, soldier. Aint that right, Jack? He was sliding down a long skislide of long snow, like. And he could feel himself beginning to go clear out of himself. And the cord he had seen that time in the Stockade that looked like it was made of come kept stretching and stretching as he coasted. Then he slowed and stopped coasting, delicately like, as if something hadnt quite made up its mind yet, and then