The Pistol (13 page)

“I see you got a pistol,” he said to Mast, who was working quietly on a detail that was putting up siding on another new hutment. “I seen you walking around here with it long time now, pretty cocky. I know some the stuff that’s went on with it.”

“Yeah?” said Mast, who did not like Paoli. “So what?”

“It’s screwing up the whole position. That’s what. It’s causing all kinds a trouble and inefficiency round here. That’s what.”

“Nobody else has noticed any inefficiency that I know of.”

“Yeah?” Paoli folded his chunky arms authoritatively. “The book says—”

“I know what the book says, Paoli,” Mast said.

“The book says,” Paoli said doggedly, nevertheless, “riflemen carry rifles. It don’t say they carry pistols. Machine gunners carry pistols.”

“Okay, so what?”

Paoli jerked his head backwards, at the command post hole behind him. “I’m taking that pistol. And I’m turning it in to Sergeant Pender.”

“You’re not taking this pistol anywhere, Paoli,” Mast said quite positively. “And neither is anybody else. Nobody’s taking this pistol off of me.”

“Yes. I am,” Paoli said. “And that’s an order.”

“Order be damned. Nobody’s taking this pistol off me except an officer or Sergeant Pender himself. I’ve had that stuff pulled on me before.”

“You won’t obey my order?”

“That order, no.”

“The book says—” Paoli began.

“To hell with the book!” Mast said fierily.

“The book says,” Paoli said anyway, “to refuse to obey a order of a noncom is a court-martial offense.” Again he jerked his head backward at the CP hole. “You come with me.”

“Sure,” Mast said. “Any old time.” But the confidence that sounded in his voice was not inside him. Here, now, descending upon him, was the thing he had dreaded most: To be turned in with the pistol. He stood and watched the event shaping itself in time; even though it hadn’t happened yet he was already now into the sequence, and it would happen, and nothing could prevent it. It twisted his stomach crampingly. Once again his old friend the Jap major charged down on him screaming, saber high, while he sat and watched him, pistolless. And after all of this, after all of what he had gone through, it would have to be Paoli who would be the agent. He followed Paoli to the hole.

“Tell you something, Mast.” Paoli slowed his pace. They threaded their way between two outcroppings. “You got no right to have a pistol. Where you get it?”

“I bought it,” Mast said wearily. “From a guy in the 8th Field.”

“Well, you got no right to it. And somebody stole it. You’re a buyer a stolen equipment. That’s bad. And how you think I feel? Me and my boys in my section? We got pistols. We was issued them. But we ain’t got rifles. You got a rifle. You was issued it. But you wasn’t issued a pistol. Yet you got one. You got a rifle and pistol both.” His voice was accusing.

“So has Sergeant Pender,” Mast said. “And so has the First Sergeant.”

“They’re first-three-graders,” Paoli said. “You’re a private. Everybody knows the pistol’s the best defense against them Samurai sabers. Okay. But what about the defense against a rifleman? For that you need a rifle. I ain’t got a rifle. Me and my boys in my section. All we got is pistols. But you got a rifle.”

“In other words, if you can’t have a rifle, I can’t have a pistol?” Mast said.

“That’s it,” Paoli said.

“Why don’t you buy yourself a rifle?”

“Where?”

“Anywhere. Look around.” But Paoli, having had his say, characteristically did not answer this and clumped on.

They found old Sergeant Pender sitting outside on a rock outcropping scratching himself in the sun. He looked up at Paoli noncommittally as they came up.

“This man refused to obey a direct order, Sergeant,” Paoli said without preamble.

“Yeah?” Pender said. “Well. What was the order?”

“I ordered him to give me that pistol. So I could turn it in to you. He refused, Sergeant.”

“Well,” Pender said. He scratched his three-day stubble of beard.

“He says he bought it off a guy in the 8th Field,” Paoli said stolidly. “So it’s stolen equipment. He’s a buyer of stolen equipment.”

“Looks like that, doesn’t it?” Pender said thoughtfully.

“That’s a court-martial offense,” Paoli said, and Mast looked at him, at his dull, perpetually injured face, at his bulling-head stolidity, that did not know it was injuring Mast, or anybody or anything else in the world for that matter. It merely went bulling ahead. Mast hated him. He stood and thrust hate at him as if it were sacks of cement, or bricks.

“That’s right, it is,” Sergeant Pender said.

“And he refused to obey a direct order from me,” Paoli said. “I want to turn him in to you for that too. The book says—”

“I know what the book says, too, Paoli,” Pender said.

“Yes, Sergeant,” Paoli said.

“Mast’s not in your section, is he?”

“No, Sergeant. He’s in a rifle platoon. But he’s got a pistol.”

“If he’s not in your section, why’d you take it on yourself to turn him in, Paoli?”

“Because he’s got a pistol. That’s what. The book says riflemen supposed to have rifles but not pistols.”

“Okay, Paoli,” Sergeant Pender said. “Thanks. I’ll take care of it. You can go.”

“Yes, Sergeant,” Paoli said, and turned on his heel and left, the set of his chunkily muscled back showing how well he thought he had done his duty. Pender stared after him thoughtfully.

“Well, Mast,” the old sergeant said, and scratched his stubble again. He made a wry grin and shook his grizzled head. “Looks like I’ll have to take that pistol of yours and turn it in to the supply room.”

“I suppose so,” Mast said, feeling sick at his stomach. He put his hands to his rifle belt to unclasp it. He knew Sergeant Pender fairly well, although he had never run around with him or got drunk with him of course, any more than he had with any of the first-three-graders.

“Look, Sarge,” he said suddenly. “Isn’t there any way I can keep it? Anything I can do to keep it. It’s— it’s—important to me.”

“Why?” Pender said.

“Well, it’s—Well, I bought it, you know? And it—it makes me feel more like a soldier, sort of. You know? And it’s a mighty good defense against those Samurai sabers you know.”

“Yes, it is that,” Pender said in his gentle way. “You mean you sort of feel it’s insurance.”

“Yes, I guess. Sort of.”

“But not everybody has them,” Pender said. “You know that. Riflemen don’t carry them and machine-gunners who have pistols don’t carry rifles. Do you want to have a better break than the next man?” He peered at Mast shrewdly, his eyes glinting.

Mast didn’t know what to answer, whether to tell him the truth or to lie. If he lied and said he didn’t want a better break than the next guy, he would be forced by sheer logic to give up the pistol. And anyway, old Pender would know whether he was lying.

“Well, yes,” he said finally. “Yes, I guess I do want a better break than the next man. Let me put it this way,” he qualified, “let’s say I want every break I can get for myself. Whether the next guy has them or not. But I don’t want the next guy
not
to have them.”

“Unless it’s your pistol,” Pender said.

Mast nodded. “Unless its my pistol.”

Pender’s eyes glinted again, even more so, and he suddenly grinned, showing his stubby, broken, stained teeth. “Well, I guess that’s only human, hunh, Mast?” he said. Mast’s answer seemed to have pleased him in some way. For a moment he scratched his grizzled head. “Well, you know, I saw you with that pistol before. And I wondered where you got it. But I figured what I didn’t know wouldn’t hurt me any. So I didn’t see it any more.” Pender raised his eyebrows and shrugged ruefully. “But now that it’s been brought to my official attention by Paoli, and everybody knows it, I don’t see what else I can do but take it and turn it in.”

“I don’t think much of anybody knows it’s been brought to your official attention, Sarge,” Mast said. “Unless Paoli tells them.”

“Paoli will tell them,” Pender said.

“I suppose so. Then there isn’t anything I can do to keep it?”

“I don’t see what, Mast. Do you?”

Mast bobbed his head. “You’ve got one, Sarge. And you’ve got a rifle, too. The First has both a pistol and a rifle, too.”

“I’m supposed to be issued a pistol.”

Again Mast bobbed his head at it. “But everybody knows that that one’s your own, and that you brought it with you into the company.”

Pender looked down at his grimy thigh and slapped the holster on it. “This one? I’ve had this one since 1918 in the first World War.”

“Please let me keep mine,” Mast forced himself to say.

Again, Sergeant Pender scratched his grizzled head. “I tell you what, Mast. This is what I’ll do. I’ll just forget Paoli brought you up here and turned you in with it. How’s that? I can’t guarantee any more than that. If the lieutenant or somebody tells me I have to take it away from you, why I’ll have to do it. But until then, I’ll just forget Paoli brought you up here. How’s that?”

“That’s fine,” Mast said, smiling all over. “That’s swell.” Then his face sobered. “But what about Paoli?”

“I’ll handle Paoli. You send him back up here when you go down.” Pender paused a moment. “Paoli’s a genius with a machine gun,” he added apropos of nothing, in an expressionless voice, and looked off at the road. Mast felt it was a partial explanation.

“You know this might really save my life someday, Sarge,” he said gratefully. “Thanks. Thanks again.”

“Yes, it might,” Pender said. “It might do that.”

Mast turned to go. “Sarge, how did you come by your pistol? In the last war.”

“I stole it off a dead American,” Sergeant Pender said expressionlessly.

“Oh,” Mast said.

“But his bad luck was my good luck. He did me a big favor. Because it saved me twice,” Sergeant Pender smiled. He scratched his beard, and his face sobered slowly. “And I don’t
really
believe he had any more use for it. Do you?” he asked.

“No,” Mast said, feeling suddenly strange. “How could he?”

“Well, I’ve wondered about it,” Sergeant Pender said. “Sometimes.” He coughed. “You send Paoli up.”

“I will, Sarge,” Mast said eagerly, smiling all over again.

The chunky Paoli did not change expression or say anything beyond an expressionless, clipped “Okay,” when Mast came up to him still wearing the pistol and told him Sergeant Pender wanted to see him. And Mast stood and watched him go on off chunkily up the hill. Then he picked up his hammer, but he could not go back to work yet. For one thing his hand was trembling violently, and so were his legs, and the thought of his near-escape made him suddenly go weak all over. He sat down by himself on an outcropping, the hammer dangling from his hand.

Out of this had come the best of all possible things, the best position he had been in since first getting the pistol. He had Sergeant Pender on his side. If the lieutenant, who rarely seemed to notice anything, or some other officer, didn’t notice it and made him give it up, he practically had it made. And why would an officer notice it? and if they did, how many of them would give a damn?

There would be other attempts to steal it, undoubtedly. Other bribes, attempting to gain Mast’s salvation. Other tricks, other subterfuges. But Mast was sure he could handle all of them. And the thing which all along had troubled him most, since he had bought this pistol from that man in the 8th Field Artillery, the thing he feared the worst—that of being turned in with it—was no longer a problem. Mast felt safer now with his pistol, and with the chance of survival it gave him, the chance of being saved, than he had ever felt since he had had it. What could possibly happen to it now?

And as the weeks passed, he became more and more reinforced in this opinion.

I
T WAS NOT
that there were no further attempts against the pistol during those next several weeks he had it. There were quite a few. But the thing that was different was that the tone, the quality, of everything had changed. It had changed because Mast himself had changed. Something, some word, some phrase, that old Sergeant Pender had said to Mast had in some indefinable way relieved him of some indefinable something. Perhaps it was a guilt about the way he had come by the pistol: buying it like that. Or perhaps it was simply pressure that he was relieved of: the simple pressure of waiting perpetually to be turned in to Authority. In this instance at any rate, Sergeant Pender
was
Authority, and he had upheld Mast. Or perhaps it was merely the knowledge that something like this with the pistol had happened to human beings before, was not a totally unique experience without precedent or guideposts to follow. And not only that, had happened as far back, as long ago, as the first World War, which was already ancient history.

Perhaps it was due to a little bit of all of these things, the change of quality, the change in Mast. Whatever it was, it had given him confidence. It had given him a belief, however erroneous, that the pistol was really his own now. Consequently, he was able to handle the new attempts against the pistol almost easily.

O’Brien was the worst offender during those weeks. One day he slyly tried to exchange belts with Mast when they were in the shower together at Hanauma Bay, but Mast had been too quick for him. Another day O’Brien showed up at the open-trench latrine while Mast was there, obviously hoping to snatch the pistol while Mast was incapacitated, but Mast had been too smart for him there too, and had had his belt with the pistol on it between his squatting feet. And there were other, similar incidents. O’Brien was always around, lurking somewhere in the background, a scavenger waiting to swoop in at the first false step, the first relaxation, and relieve Mast of his salvation.

But if O’Brien was the worst, there were also others. None of the old ones—Winstock, Burton, Grace, even Paoli—really had given up either, and there were new ones whose eyes were greedy. Mast did not care. He could handle all of them. And if he had to live in a constant state of apprehension and tension, that did not matter either. He was more than willing to make that sacrifice for the sake of the pistol.