The Ghost Mountain Boys - James E. Campbell [88]
Captain John D. Shirley was from Grand Rapids, Michigan, and he and Medendorp had been inducted together as second lieutenants in the National Guard. Shirley pointed to a position just down the track where a platoon commanded by Lieutenant Hershel Horton was set up, and volunteered to escort his old friend and Keast there. Medendorp gladly accepted.
“Shirley was a bundle of energy,” Medendorp would later write. “Every move he made was on the double. I couldn’t keep up with him, for I had already been in the jungle for two months. I could get where it was necessary to go, but couldn’t put out any spurts of energy. The trail to Horton’s position led through kunai grass. Shirley bent forward and ran along like a pheasant.”
It was not the first time Medendorp realized just how hard he had pushed himself in the last two months. But he and his men were in the same boat—they were all weary, even the youngest of the soldiers. Now, trying to keep up with a relatively fresh soldier, it was obvious that he was not up to it. Just what had the last two months done to him? Medendorp knew that he had lost weight, maybe forty pounds, since entering the jungle in early October; he could feel his ribs and his hipbones and the sharp corners of his shoulders. Now only 150 pounds, he tired easily. On the short hike to Lieutenant Horton’s position, he had to stop a number of times to catch his breath. Then there was the ulcer that looked like it might never heal.
Shirley dropped off Medendorp and Keast with Lieutenant Horton. Keast flashed Horton a smile. They had known and competed against each other since their college days when Horton was a track man at Notre Dame.
“Hello Horton. Glad to see you again,” Medendorp said.
“Quiet,” Horton snapped. “And get down.”
Medendorp, Keast, and Horton lay on their bellies like snakes in the sharp three-foot kunai grass. The hot sun beat down on them and the air was thick and wet. Except for the occasional shot, the front was largely silent. Even the birds grew quiet.
Horton, Keast, and Medendorp went over the plans for the following morning.
“This is how it’s gonna happen, boys,” Horton told them. “I’ll fire two shots with my pistol and that will be the signal to begin the attack.”
Keast said, nodding in agreement, “Two shots.”
That night Keast, like the other men, drifted in and out of sleep. He would doze off and then wake with a start, his heart pounding, his head cobwebbed with images. His son Harry moved in and out of his dreams as if he were real. Sometimes, it was as if Keast could reach out and hug him; he would pull Harry in close and hold him in his arms. Awake, his head cleared and his eyes adjusted. All he could see was darkness and the phantom shape of trees. Then the dank smell of the jungle would fill his nostrils, and he would remember where he was.
On the morning of November 30, the men were stretched tighter than piano wires, and smeared in mud with sweat dripping off their foreheads. The combination of salt and dirt clouded and stung their eyes—how in the hell were they supposed to kill Japs when they could hardly see?
In tense whispers, they passed the word down the line.
“Two shots. Listen for ’em. And then we go.”
As they waited, touching their triggers and trying not to hyperventilate, they imagined the various ways they might die. “Keep a tight asshole,” someone said. “Now is not the time to be shittin’ your pants!”
Squinting and adjusting his gaze, Keast tried to make sense of the shapeless jungle. Where was the enemy? All he could see was the morning haze cut by a dim sun, shimmering trees, and in some areas where the 3rd Battalion and the Australians had already clashed with the Japanese, bare patches where trees had been stripped of their leaves.
Lying in the kunai grass waiting for Horton to give the signal, Keast recalled the details of his photographs: Ruth sitting on the running board of the family car holding their baby son; Harry with his perfect doll face, smiling at the world. Where were they now? What were they doing? For a moment he might