Soldiers’ Pay - William Faulkner (people reading books TXT) 📗

his appointed guards. “You, Henry!” he shouted, following the vanishing white jacket.

Yaphank’s companion, sweating and pale, was about to become ill; Yaphank and Lowe sat easily respectively affable and belligerent. The newcomers touched shoulders for mutual support, alarmed but determined. Craned heads of other passengers became again smugly unconcerned over books and papers and the train rushed on along the sunset.

“Well, gentlemen,” began Yaphank conversationally.

The two civilians sprang like plucked wires and one of them said, “Now, now,” soothingly, putting his hand on the soldier. “Just be quiet, soldier, and we’ll look after you. Us Americans appreciates what you’ve done.”

“Hank White,” muttered the sodden one.

“Huh?” asked his companion.

“Hank White,” he repeated.

The other turned to the civilian cordially. “Well, bless my soul, if here ain’t old Hank White in the flesh, that I was raised with! Why, Hank! We heard you was dead, or in the piano business or something. You ain’t been fired, have you? I notice you ain’t got no piano with you.”

“No, no,” the man answered in alarm, “you are mistaken. Schluss is my name. I got a swell line of ladies’ underthings.” He produced a card.

“Well, well, ain’t that nice. Say,” he leaned confidentially toward the other, “you don’t carry no women samples with you? No? I was afraid not. But never mind. I will get you one in Buffalo. Not buy you one, of course: just rent you one, you might say, for the time being. Horace,” to Cadet Lowe, “where’s that bottle?”

“Here she is, Major,” responded Lowe, taking the bottle from beneath his blouse. Yaphank offered it to the two civilians.

“Think of something far, far away, and drink fast,” he advised.

“Why, thanks,” said the one called Schluss, tendering the bottle formally to his companion. They stooped cautiously and drank. Yaphank and Cadet Lowe drank, not stooping.

“Be careful, soldiers,” warned Schluss.

“Sure,” said Cadet Lowe. They drank again.

“Won’t the other one take nothing?” asked the heretofore silent one, indicating Yaphank’s traveling companion. He was hunched awkwardly in the corner. His friend shook him and he slipped limply to the floor.

“That’s the horror of the demon rum, boys,” said Yaphank solemnly and he took another drink. And Cadet Lowe took another drink. He tendered the bottle.

“No, no,” Schluss said with passion, “not no more right now.”

“He don’t mean that,” Yaphank said, “he just ain’t thought.” He and Lowe stared at the two civilians. “Give him time: he’ll come to hisself.”

After a while the one called Schluss took the bottle.

“That’s right,” Yaphank told Lowe confidentially. “For a while I thought he was going to insult the uniform. But you wasn’t, was you?”

“No, no. They ain’t no one respects the uniform like I do. Listen, I would of liked to fought by your side, see? But someone got to look out for business while the boys are gone. Ain’t that right?” he appealed to Lowe.

“I don’t know,” said Lowe with courteous belligerence, “I never had time to work any.”

“Come on, come on,” Yaphank reprimanded him, “all of us wasn’t young enough to be lucky as you.”

“How was I lucky?” Lowe rejoined fiercely.

“Well, shut up about it, if you wasn’t lucky. We got something else to worry about.”

“Sure,” Schluss added quickly, “we all got something to worry about.” He tasted the bottle briefly and the other said:

“Come on, now, drink it.”

“No, no, thanks, I got a plenty.”

Yaphank’s eye was like a snake’s. “Take a drink, now. Do you want me to call the conductor and tell him you are worrying us to give you whisky?”

The man gave him the bottle quickly. He turned to the other civilian. “What makes him act so funny?”

“No, no,” said Schluss. “Listen, you soldiers drink if you want: we’ll look after you.”

The silent one added like a brother and Yaphank said:

“They think we are trying to poison them. They think we are German spies, I guess.”

“No, no! When I see a uniform, I respect it like it was my mother.”

“Then, come on and drink.”

Schluss gulped and passed the bottle. His companion drank also and sweat beaded them.

“Won’t he take nothing?” repeated the silent one and Yaphank regarded the other soldier with compassion.

“Alas, poor Hank,” he said, “poor boy’s done for, I fear. The end of a long friendship, men.” Cadet Lowe said sure, seeing two distinct Hanks, and the other continued. “Look at that kind, manly face. Children together we was, picking flowers in the flowery meadows; him and me made the middleweight mule-wiper’s battalion what she was; him and me devastated France together. And now look at him.

“Hank! Don’t you recognize this weeping voice, this soft hand on your brow? General,” he turned to Lowe, “will you be kind enough to take charge of the remains? I will deputize these kind strangers to stop at the first harness factory we pass and have a collar suitable for mules made of dogwood with the initials H. W. in forget-me-nots.”

Schluss in ready tears tried to put his arm about Yaphank’s shoulders. “There, there, death ain’t only a parting. Brace up: take a little drink, then you’ll feel better.”

“Why, I believe I will,” he replied; “you got a kind heart, buddy. Fall in when fire call blows, boys.”

Schluss mopped his face with a soiled, scented handkerchief and they drank again. New York in a rosy glow of alcohol and sunset streamed past breaking into Buffalo, and with fervent new fire in them they remarked the station. Poor Hank now slept peacefully in a spittoon.

Cadet Lowe and his friend being cold of stomach, rose and supported their companions. Schluss evinced a disinclination to get off. He said it couldn’t possibly be Buffalo, that he had been to Buffalo too many times. Sure, they told him, holding him erect, and the conductor glared at them briefly and vanished. Lowe and Yaphank got their hats and helped the civilians into the aisle.

“I’m certainly glad my boy wasn’t old enough to be a soldier,” remarked a woman passing them with difficulty, and Lowe said to Yaphank:

“Say, what about him?”

“Him?” repeated the