The Odd Angry Shot (7 page)

‘How is he?' asks an Armoured Corps captain pushing between Harry and myself.

‘Lost his left leg and hip,' answers the medic closest to me.

‘And his balls,' says the other medic not taking his eyes off the huge burn dressings he is using to try and stem the blood flow.

‘Will he make it?' asks the captain. I notice that two watery lines are drawn on his dusty face.

‘Not if Jesus came down and held the saline bottle himself,' mumbles the other medic from behind clenched teeth.

The dying face; tears pouring, nose running, blood spitting. Remember when you thought, what if he does make it, what if they give him a nice new tin leg and get him on his feet again, how do you tell some randy typist that you're sorry you can't screw her because you lost your manhood on a dirty road in a place called grid reference one-eighty-three-one-nine-six? She'll look sorry in her sweet suburban way and she'll be busy the next time he asks her out:

‘Sorry, I have to wash my hair,' or ‘I'm having dinner with my girlfriends'…Excuses, excuses.

Half a man. And so much more of a man than any one of the smug bastards safe at home who stand in the streets and scream to stop the war. Ask
him
if he'd like to stop the war, smug bastards. At least he came. No fair weather protests for him. And you knew that every dust-covered, sweaty one of you on that road that day felt the same way…

‘We've lost him,' says one of the medics, standing up and wiping the blood from his hands in a piece of burn dressing. Remember, you almost felt glad for him. In fact you did.

‘TIGER beer, all the way from good old Singapore,' grunts Harry as he places the two brown cartons with the black and yellow lettering on the sandbags.

‘You'll shit for a week after a night of that stuff,' comments Rogers, bending over the green packet of dehydrated chicken and rice and drooling in anticipation.

‘Who cares? It's booze isn't it?' says Harry, laboriously opening one of the cartons with his bayonet. ‘You don't have to have any if you don't want to. I'm sure the two of us can put a bloody big dent in it without your help.'

‘Let's not be too hasty about this, now,' smiles Rogers, forgetting about the chicken and rice and moving towards the newly opened carton.

‘Piss-pot,' Harry gulps, throwing a can to Rogers.

‘May I?' I ask, with a look of mock supplication.

‘Another piss-pot.' Harry flings the cold steel can onto my bare stomach.

‘You blokes like a game?'

Bung Holey has appeared in the doorway carrying in one hand an ammunition box, the top of which has several puncture holes, and a dirty, dog-eared pack of cards in the other.

‘What's in the box?' asks Harry.

‘Me pet spider,' answers Bung.

‘Your pet what?' I ask in amazement.

‘Me pet spider. I picked him up in Baria on the laundry run.'

‘Give us a look,' says Rogers following Bung to the centre of the tent.

‘Who's yer tailor Bung?' asks Harry grinning.

Bung wore the most remarkable clothing that I ever saw on a soldier. His ‘Anzac Gentleman's Lounge Outfit', as he was wont to call it, consisted of a pair of red felt slippers, a pair of grey-white socks, a pair of black and green spotted camouflage trousers cut down to shorts, a grey sweatshirt with ‘Welcome to Bangkok' printed on the back and a white handkerchief knotted at the corners on his head.

‘Stand back. He's not what you'd call friendly,' says Bung opening the box lid gently. ‘There you are.'

‘My sweet Jesus!' says Harry.

‘Ah, shit,' says Rogers, drawing away.

Seated at the bottom of the box is the most repulsive insect I have ever seen: about six inches across, with two half-inch white fangs and two red, beady eyes set like match heads in the squat body.

‘What does he eat?' I ask.

‘Meat.'

‘Spiders don't eat meat,' says Harry, opening another black and yellow can.

‘This one does,' says Bung, closing the lid.

‘What's his name?' Rogers asks.

‘Gladys Moncrieff,' answers Bung. ‘Aha, I see you've got a few cans of ye olde Tiger.'

‘You can smell a can of piss six miles away, can't you?' says Harry, throwing a can to Bung and looking disgusted.

‘Just one of my many talents,' grins Bung, fingering the cards.

The card table and seating arrangements consist of two stretchers pulled together and four ammunition cases covered by a half shelter.

‘Dollar limit, OK?' asks Bung, shuffling the cards.

‘Yeah. Twenty cents minimum bet, eh?' says Harry, looking at Bung and putting a can to his mouth.

Bung slides the cards from the pack and onto the slippery green waterproof cloth.

‘Buy one,' says Harry.

‘One more, one more. Ratshit twenty-five.'

‘Buy one,' calculating numbers in my head.

‘Sit,' place the military scrip notes on the cards.

‘Buy one, and another, sit,' says Rogers.

Bung turns his cards over. Six, sixteen. Draws a card from the greasy pack. Six.

‘Twenty two,' yells Harry triumphantly. ‘Bank loses.'

The game continues throughout most of the afternoon, and the mound of empty black and yellow cans on the dirt floor grows in size.

‘I'll have to open another carton,' Harry gets up and sways towards the sandbags.

‘Anyone in?' comes from outside. I turn and see two figures peering around the side of the tent. One is wearing a green sweatshirt with the letters USMC stencilled across the chest. The other is bare-chested and is wearing a shoulder holster next to his skin.

‘Yeah, come in,' says Bung, nodding towards the two figures.

‘Bring your gunbearer with you and mind not to scratch the piano,' grins Harry.

‘Engineers,' says the one with the shoulder holster.

We introduce ourselves.

‘Sit down. Like a can? Only twenty cents,' says Harry, his eyes lighting up like twin neon cash registers.

‘Too right we would,' says the other one, licking his lips. He takes a small roll from his boot and peels off two grubby twenty-cent notes. The cans and money change hands.

‘What can we do for you?' asks Harry. ‘Or have you just come to see what life's like at the sewer end of the Task Force?'

‘No way,' says shoulder holster.

‘We hear you've got, or one of you blokes has got, a pet spider.'

‘Me,' says Bung proudly, patting himself on the head. ‘Why?'

‘Well, we've got a pet scorpion over at our place and we reckon that our scorpion can beat the shit out of your pet spider,' says shoulder holster smugly.

‘So?' says Bung, screwing his forehead up questioningly.

‘So we want to arrange a match. Your spider against our scorpion, fifty bucks on the outcome. How about it?'

‘How about side bets?' asks Harry.

‘Jointly controlled?'

‘Fifty-fifty on all unclaimed bets. That OK with you blokes?' says shoulder holster, looking at each of us in turn.

‘Fair enough,' answers Harry.

‘Now, as far as refreshments go, we've got hold of thirty dozen cans of Budweiser, and we've decided that as the CO and 2 IC are in Vung Tau for a few days next week that we'd make it a barbecue cum sports afternoon with the spider–scorpion contest as the highlight,' says shoulder holster scratching his neck.

‘What about the other pigs?' asks Harry. ‘Are they all going to Vung Tau too?'

‘I'm the only one left,' says shoulder holster.

‘You're an officer?' I ask in a tone of definite disbelief.

‘Lieutenant Clifford, Royal Australian Engineers,' replies shoulder holster.

‘Bullshit,' counters Bung now nursing the ammunition box in which lies our fanged contender.

‘No bullshit,' shoulder holster replies and hands me his playbook. I examine the brown cover.

‘Well?' says Harry.

‘He's on the level,' I answer as I show him the cover on which is written in large block letters the words CLIFFORD. P. I. L. T.

‘No bullshit, sir,' groans Bung raising his eyes skyward.

‘OK, fellas,' says shoulder holster getting to his feet, ‘see you and your mob next Wednesday around two o'clock, and don't forget to bring your spider, eh?'

‘We'll be there and our spider will chew the arse right off your scorpion,' yells Bung, at the departing pair.

‘All bets off if one tries to root the other,' Harry calls after them.

‘It's a deal,' laughs shoulder holster as he walks out onto the road at the end of the line of tents.

‘WAKE up, the padre's here. Quick, get up.'

Rogers' words reach my ears and register slowly in my alcohol-sodden brain. My eyes squint open painfully and the green shape before me gains form as the images come together.

‘What's wrong?' I ask, as the throbbing pain forces me to close my eyes again.

‘The padre's here, we're going to present him with his gift,' booms in my ears.

I roll onto my side and swing my legs off the side of the stretcher, levering my body into an upright position with my left arm.

‘Where is he?' I ask, trying to avoid the hot morning sunlight that knifes in through the tent flap.

‘Outside on the road. Harry's bringing him here now.'

My head feels as if it is about to crack in the middle. I focus on the empty rum bottle lying on the sandbags behind my head. My throat contracts. Jesus, a whole bottle, I think painfully.

With no small effort, I drag my boots on and haphazardly wrap the laces around the dust-stained canvas sides. The fawn, brown and green camouflage shirt slides onto my back, and my nostrils contract as the smell of stale perspiration rises from the garment.

I stand, swaying slightly forward, and reach for the sandbag wall to steady myself. Two painful steps and I lean my behind against the sandbags as I button the fly of the camouflage trousers.

‘Christ I stink. I've been sweating alcohol for the last six, no, eight hours.'

I buckle on the belt from which hangs my heavy Browning automatic in its green canvas holster and push it down low to take the pressure from my stomach. My stomach contracts and I belch.

God, what a mess, I think surveying the pile of empty cans that litter the dirt floor. Rogers comes back in and starts to laugh.

‘If you don't shut up, I'll kill you, you grinning bastard,' I say through clenched teeth, trying not to move my facial muscles at all.

‘You don't look at all well,' the voice belongs to Bung, who has also started to laugh.

‘Could this be the same freedom fighter that we saw last night drinking half a bottle of rum while standing on his head, in this very tent?'

‘So that's how it happened?' I ask meekly.

‘You were the life of the party, oh fearless leader of mine,' laughs Bung now almost in a state of hysterical collapse.

‘You even let Gladys Moncrieff sit on your arm,' says Rogers still grinning.

‘Who?' I ask, not fully registering, and still trying to avoid the sunlight.

‘Gladys Moncrieff, my pet spider,' says Bung now squatting on the floor and holding his stomach, tears pouring from his eyes.

‘Oh Jesus, no! I promise myself that I'll never touch alcohol again, never.'

Bung gets up slowly from the corner. I notice his right eyebrow with an open gash above it and that his nose is red and slightly swollen.

‘How'd you do that?' I ask.

‘Have a look in the mirror,' says Rogers handing me the four-inch square piece of glass.

My eyes focus on a swollen black mound with broken skin in the centre of my forehead.

‘How?' I ask, feeling the spot gently.

‘You and Bung had a slight disagreement last night,' says Rogers smiling.

‘What about?' I ask, as Bung extends his right hand towards me.

‘Don't know,' answers Rogers, ‘one minute you were all sitting here playing cards and the next you and Bung were beating the hell out of each other.'

‘Don't you even remember it?' says Bung.

‘No, not a thing,' I answer.

‘Never mind,' says Bung touching the cut on his forehead. ‘What's a smack in the eye between friends?'

I follow the two of them out into the hot sunlight.

Remember when Harry said the rot had set in, remember that?

‘Jesus,' is all I can say.

THE presentation goes off without a hitch. Harry does the honours.

‘On behalf of ourselves and all the other unit members present, we would like to present you with this small token of our esteem, and it is with, er, profound gratitude for all the wonderful things that you have done to make our stay in this poor country just a little more enjoyable, padre.'

‘Don't forget the jubes,' comes from within the dust-covered group that constitutes the audience.

‘…And the jubes, padre,' says Harry handing the blue painted box to the padre.

The poor man looks ridiculous, I think as I look at him standing there with his baggy shorts and matchstick legs. The padre bows his head as if to collect his thoughts and begins to speak softly.

‘Boys, this is one of the nicest moments of my life. It's not easy being a padre, trying to bring God's word to angry groups of men whose sole business is fighting wars, but I would have you understand that it's moments like these that make an outsider, and although I've been in this man's army for over fifteen years, at times I still feel an outsider, feel as though he has a place alongside you.'

‘I almost feel ashamed,' whispers Rogers.

The padre bows his head again and then raises it.

A broad smile creeps over his face as he speaks again.

‘In closing I would just like to say that this is the most well-constructed wanking machine I've ever seen.'

Have you ever seen twenty-five war-weary young soldiers stand as though touched with a wand and turned to stone?