The Night In Question Read Free Page B

expression, the plausible blandness worn like a mask over cunning and mockery. It made B.D. want to catch Ryan’s eye and let him know that he saw what was going on. He put the book back on Ryan’s bed.
    His stomach hurt. It was a new pain, not sharp but steady, and so diffuse that B.D. had to probe with his fingers to find its source. When he bent over the pain got worse, then eased up when he stood and walked back and forth in front of his bunk. One of the new guys, a big Hawaiian, said, “Hey, Biddy, you okay?” B.D. stopped pacing. He had forgotten there was anyone else in the room. This Hawaiian and a guy with a green eyeshade and a bunch of others were playing cards. They were all watching him.
    B.D. said, “Haven’t you read the surgeon-general’s warning?”
    The Hawaiian looked down at his cigarette.
    “Fuckin’ Biddy,” said the man with the eyeshade, as if B.D. wasn’t there. “Eight months I’ve been in this shithole and he’s still calling me
new guy
.”
    “Ryan calls me Tonto,” the Hawaiian said. “Do I looklike an Indian? Seriously, man, do I look like an Indian?”
    “You don’t exactly look like a white man.”
    “Yeah? Well I don’t
even
look like an Indian, okay?”
    “Call him Kemo Sabe. See how he likes that.”
    “Ryan? He’d love it.”
    B.D. walked toward Sergeant Holmes’s hooch. The sky was low and heavy. They’d had hamburgers that night for dinner, “ratburgers,” Ryan called them
(Hey, Cookie, how about tucking in the tail on this one?)
, and the air still smelled of grease. B.D. felt a sudden coldness on his back and dropped to a crouch, waiting for something; he didn’t know what. He heard the chugging of generators, crumple and thud of distant artillery, the uproarious din of insects. B.D. huddled there. Then he stood and looked around and went on his way.
    Sergeant Holmes was stretched out on his bunk, listening to a big reel-to-reel through a set of earphones that covered his head like a helmet. He had on red Bermuda shorts. His eyes were closed, his long spidery fingers waving languorously over his sunken belly. He had the blackest skin B.D. had ever seen on anyone. B.D. sat down beside him and shook his foot. “Hey,” he said. “Hey, Russ.”
    Sergeant Holmes opened his eyes, then slowly pulled the earphones off.
    “Dixon has no business sending Ryan out on ambush.”
    Sergeant Holmes sat up and put the earphones on the floor. “You wrong about that. That’s what the man’s business is, is sending people out.”
    “Ryan’s been out. Plenty. He’s under two months now.”
    “Same-same you, right?”
    B.D. nodded.
    “I see why you worried.”
    “Fuck you,” B.D. said.
    Sergeant Holmes grinned. It was an event in that black face.
    “This goes against the deal, Russ.”
    “Deal? What’s this deal shit? You got something on paper?”
    “It was understood.”
    “Eltee Pinch gone, Biddy. Eltee Dixon head rat-catcher now, and he got his own different philosophy.”
    “Philosophy,” B.D. said.
    “That’s how it is,” Sergeant Holmes said.
    B.D. sat there, looking at the floor, rubbing his knuckles. “What do you think?”
    “I think Lieutenant Dixon in charge now.”
    “The new guys can take care of themselves.
We
did.”
    “You did shit, Biddy. You been duckin’ ever since you got here, you and Ryan both.”
    “We took our chances.”
    “Hey, that’s how it is, Biddy. You don’t like it, talk to the Eltee.” He pulled his earphones on, lay back on the bunk and closed his eyes. His fingers waved in the air like seaweed.
    A few days later Lieutenant Dixon put together another ambush patrol. Before reading off the names he asked if one of the short-timers would like to volunteer. Nobody answered. Everyone was quiet, waiting. Lieutenant Dixon studied his clipboard, wrote something, and looked up. “Right. So who’s going?” When no one spoke he said, “Come on, it isn’t all that bad. Is it, Ryan?”
    B.D. was standing next to him.