W.E.B. Griffin - The Corps VII - Behind the Lines

"Pistol cartridges, huh?" Everly said scornfully, taking the weapon.

"Hot pistol cartridges. They'd blow up a pistol."

"Will they kill anybody?"

"Yeah," McCoy said. "If you hit him, and he's not five hundred yards away."

"You know that?" Everly asked dubiously.

"I know that. They're not a real rifle, but they're a lot better than a pistol."

"Most people can't shoot a pistol to save their ass," Everly said.

"That's the whole idea," McCoy said.

"You've got ammo, I hope? We're fucking near out of ammo, ours and Japanese. We're making our own fucking bullets from curtain rods, and load-ing the cases with powder from Jap rounds. I'm down to thirteen rounds for this." He shifted his Thompson on his shoulder.

"There's ammo for these, and a couple of hundred.45 ACP and.30-06 rounds. If we can get it off the sub."

"Grenades? We could really use some grenades."

"Not on this shipment," McCoy said. "Maybe the next."

"Is there going to be another shipment? More submarines?"

"In twenty-one days. If we can keep ourselves from getting killed before then," McCoy said. He slit open a second parcel containing four U.S. Car-bines, Caliber.30 Ml, slung three of them around his shoulder, and started back to the beach.

Lieutenant Chambers D. Lewis, dragging two plastic-wrapped parcels be-hind him, came out of the water.

"Good morning, Mr. McCoy," he said. "I see the Marines have landed, and the situation is presumably well in hand?"

"You weren't supposed to come ashore," McCoy said.

"I knew how important it was to you that Captain Macklin join your beach party," Lewis said. "And I could not, I found, just go sailing away without proving to you that I could paddle a rubber boat as well as you."

McCoy looked over his shoulder. Macklin was moving as quickly as he could through chest-deep water toward the beach. So far as McCoy could see, he was not towing anything behind him.

And then he laughed. "Oh, Christ, look at that."

Gunnery Sergeant Zimmerman, water streaming off his body, looking very distressed and annoyed, plodded heavily through the sand toward them, dragging four obviously heavy plastic-wrapped parcels. Behind him came the two sailors, each dragging two plastic-wrapped parcels.

"Why didn't you get out of the boat, the way I told you?" McCoy asked.

"I couldn't see how deep the water was, and I didn't want to drown, for Christ's sake. I can't swim!" He recognized Everly. "Hey! What do you say, Everly? How they hanging?"

"Can't complain. McCoy told me they made you a gunny."

"Yeah. How about that? You going to lend a hand with this crap, or just stand there with your thumb up your ass?"

"You may get stuck here," McCoy said to Lewis. "The place is liable to be crawling with Japs anytime now. The Fertig guy-what's his name, Ev-erly?"

"Weston, Sir," Everly said. "Captain James Weston."

He called me "Sir," McCoy realized, surprised. I'll be damned.

"... Captain Weston took out a four-man Jap patrol as we were coming ashore. Everly thinks other Japs will come looking for them."

"That would be best," Everly said.

"Best?" McCoy asked. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Worst is that they did hear Mr. Weston's Thompson and went off to tell somebody. Best would be if they didn't hear the gunfire, but send a couple of people looking for the first patrol. Better would be we could find the truck they're in-"

"We don't know there's a truck," McCoy interrupted.

"-and take that out, hide the truck and the bodies in the bush someplace where they won't be found for a couple of days. That would make it less likely that the Japs could find the stuff we're going to stash here."

"Or find the truck and take it five miles, ten miles from here," McCoy said thoughtfully.

"Even better," Everly agreed.

"What's wrong with your ankle?" McCoy asked.

"I fell out of a tree and sprained it," Everly said.

"Then how are we going to find the truck?"

"I could get a tree limb, and make a crutch or something."

"You tell me where you think this truck is, Everly, and I'll find the fucker," Gunny Zimmerman said matter-of-factly.

"You're going to have to go with him, Everly," McCoy said. "There's no way around it. We'll get the stuff into the jungle and wait here for you."

"Zimmerman, are those little rifles any good?" Everly asked.

"For what we're going to use them for," Zimmerman said.

"Well, you better give me one, then. All I have is thirteen rounds for the Thompson. Unless... Where's that.45 ammo, McCoy?"

"I don't know where it is right now."

"Then hand me one of them little rifles. We don't have much time."

"There is, of course," McCoy said, looking at Lewis, "one other option."

"You want me to go with them? Why not?"

"That's not what I meant," McCoy said, and then, pointing out to sea, went on. "Captain Weston is almost at the Sunfish. I could radio them to get the hell out of here the second he's aboard and... Maybe that's what I should do."

"The U.S. Navy has gone to considerable expense and effort, Mr. McCoy, to place that vessel where she lies," Lewis said. "I don't think anyone aboard would want to leave until they unload the cargo, or a Jap destroyer appears."

McCoy looked at him thoughtfully.

"Whichever comes first," Lewis added.

"You really are liable to get stuck here with us," McCoy said. "You un-derstand that?"

"I had that unpleasant thought shortly after I got in the rubber boat," Lewis said. "Shall I pass the Sunfish the word to start unloading cargo?"

"The radio's right inside the bushes, over there," McCoy said, pointing.

Captain Robert B. Macklin waded the final steps ashore and then threw himself flat on the sand, as if exhausted.

"He hurt, or what?" Everly asked, concerned.

"Fuck him, let him lie there," McCoy said.

"We have to get those boats back into the water," Lewis said, and then bellowed "Macklin!" in a surprisingly loud voice.

Macklin raised his head to look at him, then moved his arms in a helpless gesture.

"Get your ass moving, Macklin, start helping us get the boats back through the surf, or I'll shoot you myself!" Lieutenant Lewis called.

Captain Macklin continued to make gestures implying helpless exhaustion until Lieutenant Lewis took one of the carbines from Lieutenant McCoy, chambered a round, and put the weapon to his shoulder. Then, his strength having miraculously returned, Captain Macklin scurried down the beach, grabbed the line on a rubber boat, and started to drag the boat toward the water.

Lieutenant Everly's eyes grew wide, but he said nothing.

"Were you really going to shoot him?" McCoy asked, a smile on his face.

"I don't know," Lewis said wonderingly. "Fortunately for both of us, neither did he." He then had a second thought. "Why don't we just let him paddle out to the Sunfish and go aboard?"

"He stays," McCoy said firmly.

Lewis nodded, turned away, and trotted toward the radio.

"Who's he, McCoy?" Everly asked.

"He's a dog robber for an admiral at Pearl Harbor."

"I meant the asshole on the beach."

"It's a long story, Everly. I'll tell you later," he said.

[FOUR]

United States Submarine Sunfish

126? 48 East Longitude 7? 35 West Latitude

Philippine Sea

0527 Hours 24 December 1942

"Skipper?" Lieutenant Amos P. Youngman, USN, asked, leaving the second part of the interrogatory-"Do you see that?"-unsaid.

"I see it," Lieutenant Commander Warren T. Houser, USN, replied.

Both Commander Houser and Lieutenant Youngman were on the crowded conning-tower bridge of the Sunfish, binoculars to their eyes, alternately watching the rubber boats close to shore and scanning the skies and horizon for signs of Japanese activity.