The Naked and the Dead - Norman Mailer [249]
Hearn spoke to them. "It's three o'clock, men. We've got a lot of ground to cover. I want to make at least ten miles before dark." There was some muttering in the platoon. "What, are you jokers bitching already?" Hearn said.
"Have a heart, Lieutenant," Minetta called out.
"If we don't make it today, we'll just have to do it tomorrow," Hearn said. He found himself slightly annoyed. "Anything you care to tell them, Sergeant?"
"Yes, sir." Croft stared at them, fingering the sodden collar of his fatigue shirt. "I want all you men to remember where the trail is. You can line it up by those three rocks over there, or by that little ol' tree that's bent in half, an' if for any reason one of you troopers gets lost, you wanta remember what these hills look like, so's when you head south and reach the stream, you'll know whether to turn right or left." He paused and readjusted a grenade in his belt. "From now on we're gonna be in open country, an' you gotta keep patrol discipline. I don't want any goddam yelling or messing around, and you damn sure better keep your eyes open. When we cross a ridge-line we do it fast and low. If you're gonna walk like a bunch of sheep you'll be ambushed. . ." He fingered his chin. "I don' know if we're gonna make ten miles or two 'cause you can't tell ahead of time, but we're damn sure gonna do it right, I don't care what distance." There was a low murmur from the men, and Hearn flushed slightly. Croft had virtually contradicted him.
"All right, men, let's go," he said sharply. They started off in a long loose column, plodding forward wearily. The tropical sun glared on them, reflected from every blade of grass, and dazzled their eyes. The heat made them sweat profusely; their uniforms, which had been wet first by the spray of the boat, had been unable to dry for almost twenty-four hours, and the cloth stuck dankly to their bodies. The sweat ran into their eyes and smarted, the sun burned on their fatigue caps, the high kunai grass lashed against their faces, and the unending hills absorbed their sinews. Their hearts would pound as they toiled up a hill, and they would sob with exertion, their faces burning with fever. An intense pendant silence had settled over the hills, become ominous at last in its depth and pervasiveness. The men had not thought about the Japanese at all while they were in the jungle; the denseness of the brush, the cruelty of the river, had absorbed all their attention. The last thing they had considered was an ambush.
But now in the great open quiet of the hills they felt a constraint and fear even through their fatigue. The hills stared down on them when they were in a valley, and in crossing a ridge-line the contrast rendered them naked, as though they could be seen for miles. The country was beautiful; the hills were tinted a canary yellow, and spread about them in an unending run of broad smooth curves, but the men did not appreciate the beauty. They had the isolation, the insignificance of insects traversing an endless beach.
They walked for a mile across a deep flat valley, and the sun blazed on them. The kunai grass grew to terrifying heights. On the plain each blade of grass was an inch wide and many feet high. Sometimes they would trudge for a hundred yards through grass that was over their heads. It roused a new kind of terror in them, drove them on more quickly than was bearable. They felt as though they blundered through a forest, but the forest was not solid. It weaved and swayed, rustled against their limbs, was soft and yielding, and therefore nauseous. They were afraid to let the man in front move too far away, for they could not see more than two or three yards, and so they dogged at each other's heels, the grass whipping nastily into their faces. Every now and then a cloud of gnats would be disturbed and flicker tantalizingly about them, goading their flash with a dozen tiny bites. There were many spiders in the field, and the webs kept trickling across their faces and hands, lashing them forward in a minor frenzy. Pollen and bits of grass teased their