Battle Cry (54 page)

He had a silly grin as he accepted the kisses of the many Rogers and MacPhersons who came up the receiving line. Pat was adorable and tolerant as she kissed all the squad. Even though they had loused up the ceremony she was not angry. She radiated happiness and sweetly forgave them. As the church emptied, Sam Huxley brought up the rear. Pat drew him aside.

“It was very nice of you to drive all the way up here, Colonel.”

“I’m happy, Pat, very happy,” he said.

“You will come to the reception?”

“I’m afraid we’re A.W.O.L.,” he said. “Really, we must return to camp, but we just had to come for the wedding.”

“Colonel.”

“Yes, Pat?”

“Would you settle for the middle name if we have a boy—Timothy Huxley?”

Huxley put his arms around her and kissed her cheek. “Thank you very much, my dear,” he said.

The reception took place in a large banquet room of the farmer’s meeting hall in Masterton. If Masterton was dry, it was obvious that the Rogers and MacPherson families had not heard about it. Either that, or they had drag with the local constabulary. The honor table and the two long tables running off either end of it were loaded with bottles of every shape and breed. There were wines, ales, whiskies, rums and mixtures never seen before by the eyes of men, and several cases of homemade beer stood ready against a wall if the other bottles should run dry.

The squad occupied the honor table at the head of the hall with Pat and Andy and her immediate family. At the right table was the MacPherson clan, on the left, the Rogers clan. Scattered tables held the overflow and in a separate little room the children held their own celebration with milk and soda pop. A bandstand held the more talented kinsmen who played dance music.

The photographers in the families dashed about madly posing up, as the entire entourage assembled. Platter after platter came from the kitchen detail of farmers’ wives. I had never seen so much food and drink in one place—it looked like the FMF mess hall. For the Marines they brought forth plates piled high with fried chicken and potatoes. The clans knew how to run a shindig.

Harn Rogers, the family elder and toastmaster, babbled through a well-planned speech on the happy union while they all gorged.

“Gentlemen,” Harn climaxed the oratory, “charge your glasses. I propose a toast.”

All refilled and everyone in the hall arose. The patriarch of the Rogers clan gave a toast to the bride and groom and everyone sang:

“For they are jolly good fellows,

For they are jolly good fellows,

For they are jolly good fellows,

And so say all of us….

Hip, hip, hurray!”

It was the damnedest thing I had ever heard. They downed their drink and were no sooner seated than the MacPherson side of the room was heard from. The elder MacPherson was on his feet. “Gentlemen, charge your glasses. I propose a toast.”

And they all went through the routine again. Before I could get my teeth into a drumstick, the Rogers’ were heard from. “Gentlemen, charge your glasses.”

The MacPhersons weren’t going to be outdone by their rivals. I began feeling like an elevator. The only time I got to sit down was about the ninth round when they finally got to toasting the best man. I felt silly as hell when they gave out with that
“Jolly good fellow,”
but the
“Hip, hip, hurray!”
really made me blush.

“My men were close to oblivion even before they came into the hall but they weren’t going to be outdone by the hard-drinking kinsmen of the bride. (The ladies had long ago switched to soda pop.) Finally, to break the monotony the Marines began unlimbering a few toasts of their own.

In the next two hours we drank to Pat, Andy, the Rogers clan, the MacPherson clan, the squad, the Marine Corps, the New Zealand army, navy and air force, Sam Huxley, Chaplain Peterson, the King, the Queen, the Vicar of St. Peter’s, President Roosevelt, New York City, Wellington, Masterton, North Island, South Island, Australia, the Second Division, the Sixth Marines, Ginny Simms, Rita Hayworth, Stalin, and all the Allies and dozens of lesser celebrities and landmarks.

By the time the rug was rolled back for dancing there was a bursting frivolity and brotherhood the like of which I had never seen. No wonder the New Zealanders got along so well with the Maoris.

Burnside had ducked the place about halfway through the drinking bout, with a lovely MacPherson maid of honor. Danny and L.Q., recuperating from malaria, were unable to stand the pace and staggered from the hall soon after Burnside and the girl left.

Bleary and wavering, L.Q. and Danny propped themselves against a building and caught their breath, “Shay, Danny, didya see Burny leave with that broad?”

“Yeah,” hicked Danny.

“Shay, we better find ole Burny. He’s liable to get the shame treatment that ole Andy got.”

“Where you suppose he is?”

“At a bar.”

“Naw. No bars in this town.”

“Anyhoo, we gotta save ole Burnside from a fate worsen death.”

“Yeah, we gotta save our old pal, the billygoat.”

They hailed a taxi and spilled in…. “Shay, where can we get a drink, old bloke?”

“Nothing in this ruddy town, chappies,” the cabbie answered.

“Shay, you seen Burnside?”

“The Marine sergeant with the fancy ribbon about his shoulder and the girl, just left the reception?”

“Did he look like a billygoat?”

“Wot?”

“Did he…where you take him?”

“Really, lads. I wouldn’t butt in.”

“What I tell you, L.Q. He’ll go like our old pal Andy.”

“Speak up, man. This is a dire emergency.”

“Well, if you insist. They went over the city line. Only pub and hotel about.”

“Be off to the city line.”

“Hurry old bean, or we’ll hang you from the highest yard-arm in all Liverpool.”

The cabbie’s pleas for privacy for the pair were in vain and only heightened the emergency in the minds of Danny and L.Q. After a wild ride the taxi stopped beside a large inn. Danny and L.Q. staggered out, advising the driver to keep his motor running.

They broke into the bar, which was empty save for the bartender cleaning glasses for the coming night rush of trade into the wet zone. Danny, with memories of San Diego, sprang over the bar, landing almost on the keeper’s back, and demanded of the startled and mild little man, “What you do with him?”

“Wot is this—a holdup?”

“Where’s the Sarge? We know he’s here.”

“Yeah,” bellowed L.Q., helping himself to a quart of ale. “We come to save him from a fate worsen death.”

“But…but…”

“Speak up, good man. No time for tomfoolery.”

“You lads are drunk.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“He says we’re drunk, L.Q.”

“
Tsk, tsk,
big Dan.”

“But you blokes can’t break in on them. Be good lads—he’s got a sheila in the room.”

“Oh ho, the plot sickens.”

“Hurry, where is he? We got to save him. Poor ole Burny.”

“Lads, please,” pleaded the innkeeper. Danny grabbed him and shook him. “He’s in a room at the end of the hall, to the left,” the little man finally admitted.

The pair wended a wavy course down the corridor and smashed in the door. Sergeant Burnside and the girl were on the bed. She shrieked and fell flat, drawing the sheets over her.

“Sarge! We come to save you,” Danny yelled.

“Hey, Burnside, you’re out of uniform,” L.Q. noted.

“I’ll kill you bastards for this!”

The girl became hysterical, but Burnside cursed his way into his trousers. L.Q. and Danny shook hands on the successful completion of their mission.

“Come on, Burnside. Escape while there’s still time. We got a cab running outside.”

The girl shrieked again and the innkeeper popped his head into the doorway. “Easy now, lads, easy. This is a refined place.”

“I’ll kill you!”

“Gee, Burnside, we was only trying to save you.”

“Get out!”

They staggered out sadly. “Ungrateful bastard,” Danny muttered.

I sat in the bus depot and checked the squad as they staggered in one by one, filed aboard the bus, and passed out. Burnside came in raving. “Where’s Forrester and Jones? I’m going to kill the bastards!”

It took me several moments to calm the Sergeant and get him aboard, and I had to keep him from touching their unconscious hulks. I left him mumbling to himself and returned to the depot. All were in but Marion. I figured he must have gotten himself tangled up with the public library or some other cultural point of interest.

Pat and Andy were due at the depot to catch a bus north for a two-day honeymoon. A car pulled up. From it debarked four large Rogers kinsmen hauling the stiff, unconscious body of Andy Hookans. Pat comforted her mother as she also directed the “pallbearers” to the proper bus with her luggage and her husband. They spilled the Swede into the long seat in the rear. Pat kissed me and thanked me for my efforts.

“Are you angry, Pat?”

“Angry?”

“I mean about the way the boys behaved and for getting Andy drunk?”

She smiled. “Goodness, no. I’ve been going to weddings of the clan for twenty-six years. I haven’t seen a bridegroom leave sober yet.” Enoch cleared his throat as Mrs. Rogers looked knowingly in his direction. “I’m too happy to be angry at anyone, Mac.”

“Good luck,” I said as she waved good-by to the gathering.

“Fine boy, that Andy, fine boy,” Enoch said.

But as Pat boarded the bus, a jeep with three M.P.s pulled up. Sister Mary was between two of them. I rushed up as they dragged Marion out.

“This belong to you?” one of the men asked me. “He was trying to take on everybody at the Red Cross club. Said he wasn’t a candy-assed Marine.”

“It’s mine,” I said.

“We should have brigged him, but since he’s a Guadalcanal boy…”

“Thanks, fellows, thanks a lot. I’ll take care of this.”

Marion wavered, brushed off his blouse, straightened his field scarf and turned to Enoch and Mrs. Rogers, “I fear, really,” he spouted unevenly, “my conduct has been obnoxious. I shall write you a letter of apology in the morning. I am quite ashamed of my behavior.” He pitched into my arms, out cold. I bid a hasty farewell and dragged Marion aboard as the bus gunned its motor, then leaned out of an open window and waved.

“Fine lads, all of them are fine lads,” Enoch said as they pulled out of the depot.

CHAPTER 8

HUXLEY
propped his feet up on his desk and his long legs pumped the tilted chair back and forth. He studied the bulletin before him intently. Major Wellman tamped the freshly laid tobacco into the bowl of his pipe and lit up. He glanced over Huxley’s shoulder. Huxley looked up. “See this, Wellman?”

“I was afraid you’d get around to looking at it sooner or later,” Wellman answered.

“Very interesting report, very interesting. How many days did it take that battalion to reach Foxton?”

“Four.”

“Hmmm.”

“I know what you are thinking, Sam,” the exec said.

Huxley ruffled through the bulletin again. A battalion of the Eighth Marines had taken a grueling forced march from camp to Foxton, some sixty odd miles north.

“Let’s see,” Huxley said. “Concrete highway…mild hills…two meals a day…one ration and one with field kitchen. Bedrolls brought up by motor transport.” He rubbed his chin as he opened his map of North Island and ran his finger from McKay’s Crossing northward. “Should be an interesting hike.”

“It’s a rough one, Sam. Cherokee White lost a lot of men.”

“Let’s see here. Trucks met them at a meadow outside Foxton and drove them back in. Better than sixty miles…heavy combat packs.” He thumbed through the report. He reached for the field phone, tossed the butterfly switch and cranked the handle.

“Pawnee White,” the switchboard answered.

“Get me Colonel Malcolm, Windsor Hotel.”

“Yes sir. Shall I ring you back?” the operator said.

“Right. I’ll get Malcolm’s O.K. Better get Marlin in here to arrange an advance scout unit for bivouacs along the route. Any other battalions giving it a try?”

“Both Pawnee Red and Blue are moving on it.”

“You knew about this all the time, Wellman.”

“You’d get around to it,” the exec smiled. “Incidentally, you won’t need an advance unit. We can use the same bivouacs the Eighth used.”

Huxley dropped his feet to the floor with a thud. “I don’t think so. We are going to beat them up there by a day.”

“I had a hunch you’d try to do that.”

“Try, hell. I’ll lay you ten to one we set a record that they won’t even bother to go after…
Ziltch!
”

The little orderly tumbled in the door. “Yes, sir,” he snapped.

“Get the staff and company commanders here on the double.”

The phone rang three sharp bursts. Huxley lifted it.

“Hello, Colonel Malcolm? This is Huxley. How is everything in Wellington, sir? Fine, glad to hear it. Say, Colonel, I want to take a little walk up to Foxton with my boys….”

I didn’t like the smell of this one. Highpockets had been waiting for a deal like this. He wanted some other outfit to set a pace for us to break. Breaking records at the expense of our sweat was his forte. The weather was bad. Gray clouds were blowing in from the ocean and looked like they’d start spilling at any moment. If we were going to beat Cherokee White’s mark to Foxton and scare off all other competition, a soggy highway wouldn’t make it any easier.

At least we got one break. We wouldn’t have to hike with ass packs. We had received a shipment of Army SCR walkie-talkies. They were little handsets weighing just a few pounds, set to one channel. They were perfect for communications on the march—if they worked. We packed the TBYs in the comm cart, just in case.