John Passos - 3 books to know World War I

“Que voulez-vous?”

Fuselli glanced at Eisenstein. He and Stockton were deep in excited conversation with the Frenchman again. Fuselli heard that uncomfortable word that always made him angry, he did not know why, “Revolution.”

“Yvonne,” he said so that only she could hear, “what you say you and me get married?”

“Marries.... moi et toi?” asked Yvonne in a puzzled voice.

“We we.”

She looked him in the eyes a moment, and then threw hack her head in a paroxysm of hysterical laughter.

Fuselli flushed scarlet, got to his feet and strode out, slamming the door behind him so that the glass rang. He walked hurriedly back to camp, splashed with mud by the long lines of grey motor trucks that were throbbing their way slowly through the main street, each with a yellow eye that lit up faintly the tailboards of the truck ahead. The barracks were dark and nearly empty. He sat down at the sergeant's desk and began moodily turning over the pages of the little blue book of Army Regulations.

The moonlight glittered in the fountain at the end of the main square of the town. It was a warm dark night of faint clouds through which the moon shone palely as through a thin silk canopy. Fuselli stood by the fountain smoking a cigarette, looking at the yellow windows of the Cheval Blanc at the other end of the square, from which came a sound of voices and of billiard balls clinking. He stood quiet letting the acrid cigarette smoke drift out through his nose, his ears full of the silvery tinkle of the water in the fountain beside him. There were little drifts of warm and chilly air in the breeze that blew fitfully from the west. Fuselli was waiting. He took out his watch now and then and strained his eyes to see the time, but there was not light enough. At last the deep broken note of the bell in the church spire struck once. It must be half past ten.

He started walking slowly towards the street where Yvonne's grocery shop was. The faint glow of the moon lit up the grey houses with the shuttered windows and tumultuous red roofs full of little dormers and skylights. Fuselli felt deliciously at ease with the world. He could almost feel Yvonne's body in his arms and he smiled as he remembered the little faces she used to make at him. He slunk past the shuttered windows of the shop and dove into the darkness under the arch that led to the court. He walked cautiously, on tiptoe, keeping close to the moss-covered wall, for he heard voices in the court. He peeped round the edge of the building and saw that there were several people in the kitchen door talking. He drew his head back into the shadow. But he had caught a glimpse of the dark round form of the hogshead beside the kitchen door. If he only could get behind that as he usually did, he would be hidden until the people went away.

Keeping well in the shadow round the edge of the court, he slipped to the other side, and was just about to pop himself in behind the hogshead when he noticed that someone was there before him.

He caught his breath and stood still, his heart thumping. The figure turned and in the dark he recognised the top sergeant's round face.

“Keep quiet, can't you?” whispered the top sergeant peevishly.

Fuselli stood still with his fists clenched. The blood flamed through his head, making his scalp tingle.

Still the top sergeant was the top sergeant, came the thought. It would never do to get in wrong with him. Fuselli's legs moved him automatically back into a corner of the court, where he leaned against the damp wall; glaring with smarting eyes at the two women who stood talking outside the kitchen door, and at the dark shadow behind the hogshead. At last, after several smacking kisses, the women went away and the kitchen door closed. The bell in the church spire struck eleven slowly and mournfully. When it had ceased striking, Fuselli heard a discreet tapping and saw the shadow of the top sergeant against the door. As he slipped in, Fuselli heard the top sergeant's good-natured voice in a large stage whisper, followed by a choked laugh from Yvonne. The door closed and the light was extinguished, leaving the court in darkness except for a faint marbled glow in the sky.

Fuselli strode out, making as much noise as he could with his heels on the cobble stones. The streets of the town were silent under the pale moon. In the square the fountain sounded loud and metallic. He gave up his pass to the guard and strode glumly towards the barracks. At the door he met a man with a pack on his back.

“Hullo, Fuselli,” said a voice he knew. “Is my old bunk still there?”

“Damned if I know,” said Fuselli; “I thought they'd shipped you home.”

The corporal who had been on the Red Sox outfield broke into a fit of coughing.

“Hell, no,” he said. “They kep' me at that goddam hospital till they saw I wasn't goin' to die right away, an' then they told me to come back to my outfit. So here I am!”

“Did they bust you?” said Fuselli with sudden eagerness.

“Hell, no. Why should they? They ain't gone and got a new corporal, have they?”

“No, not exactly,” said Fuselli.

––––––––

MEADVILLE STOOD NEAR the camp gate, watching the motor trucks go by on the main road. Grey, lumbering, and mud-covered, they throbbed by sloughing in and out of the mud holes in the worn road in an endless train stretching as far as he could see into the town and as far as he could see up the road.

He stood with his legs far apart and spat into the center of the road; then he turned to the corporal who had been in the Red Sox outfield and said:

“I'll be goddamed if there ain't somethin' doin'!”

“A hell of a lot doin',” said the corporal, shaking his head.

“Seen that guy Daniels who's been to the front?”

“No.”

“Well, he says hell's broke loose. Hell's broke loose!”

“What's happened?... Be gorry, we may see some active service,” said Meadville, grinning. “By God, I'd give the best colt on my ranch to see some action.”

“Got a ranch?” asked the corporal.

The motor trucks kept on grinding past monotonously; their drivers were so splashed with mud it was hard to see what uniform they wore.

“What d'ye think?” asked Meadville. “Think I keep store?”

Fuselli walked past them towards the town.

“Say, Fuselli,” shouted Meadville. “Corporal says hell's broke loose out there. We may smell gunpowder yet.”

Fuselli stopped and joined them.

“I guess poor old Bill Grey's smelt plenty of gunpowder by this time,” he said.

“I wish I had gone with him,” said Meadville. “I'll try that little trick myself now the good weather's come on if we don't get a move on soon.”

“Too damn risky!”

“Listen to the kid. It'll be too damn risky in the trenches.... Or do you think you're goin' to get a cushy job in camp here?”

“Hell, no! I want to go to the front. I don't want to stay in this hole.”

“Well?”

“But ain't no good throwin' yerself in where it don't do no good.... A guy wants to get on in this army if he can.”

“What's the good o' gettin' on?” said the corporal. “Won't get home a bit sooner.”

“Hell! but you're a non-com.”

Another train of motor trucks went by, drowning their Talk.

Fuselli was packing medical supplies in a box in a great brownish warehouse full of packing cases where a little sun filtered in through the dusty air at the corrugated sliding tin doors. As he worked, he listened to Daniels talking to Meadville who worked beside him.

“An' the gas is the goddamndest stuff I ever heard of,” he was saying. “I've seen fellers with their arms swelled up to twice the size like blisters from it. Mustard gas, they call it.”