All of a sudden, it seems like there is about a hundrit people runnin around on the bridge, everbody hollerin an screamin an givin each other orders, an some of them even be givin each other the finger. Not long afterward, some fellers from the Coast Guard come aboard, complainin we has just dumped ten million gallons of crude awl into Prince William Sound. Birds, seals, fish, polar bears, whales, an Exkimos—all will be destroyed by what we has now done. An there is gonna be hell to pay.
“Who was in charge on this bridge?” says a Coast Guard officer.
“He was!” everbody on the bridge shouted at once, all pointin they fingers right at me.
I knowed right then that I am in the doghouse for sure.
MANIAC ARMY MAN AT HELM OF DISASTER SHIP, says one of the headlines. CERTIFIED NUT DRIVING OIL SPILL BOAT, says another. CATACLYSM CAUSED BY DANGEROUS FOOL; this is typical of the kind of shit I got to endure.
In any case, they sent up a three-star general from Washington to deal with me an my problems. In a way this is sort of lucky, since the army does not wish to get involved in any sense with the blame for the Exxon-Valdez mess, an the best thing they can do is get me the hell out of there—quick.
“Gump,” the general says, “if it was up to me, I would have you before a firing squad for this, but since it isn’t, I am gonna do the next best thing, which is to have your big stupid ass transferred as far away from here as possible, which, in this case, is to Berlin, Germany. Maybe, if we are lucky, nobody is gonna be able to find you there, and so they’ll have to put all the blame on old Captain McGivver for this disaster. Do you read me?”
“Yessir,” I says, “but how I’m gonna get there?”
“The plane, Gump, is on the runway. Its motors are running. You got five minutes.”
Chapter Ten
Goin to Germany was not all it was cracked up to be. This was account of I was escorted there in handcuffs an leg irons by four MPs who kept remindin me that their orders was, if I done anythin funny, they was to immediately crack me over the head with their nightsticks.
Somebody high up in command had apparently give the order that I was to be assigned the dirtiest job in the entire army, an the order was faithfully carried out. I was sent to a tank company, where my duty was to clean all the mud off the tank treads—an let me say this: There is plenty of mud on the tank tracks in Germany in the winter.
Also, word had apparently got out that I am a Jonah or somethin, cause ain’t nobody wants to speak to me except the sergeants, an all they do is holler at me. The days are cold an wet, an the nights are miserable, an I ain’t never felt so lonely. I wrote some letters to little Forrest, but his answers are kind of short an I get the impression maybe he is sort of forgettin me. Sometimes at night, I tried to dream about Jenny but it ain’t no use. Looks like she done forgot about me, too.
One day somebody tole me I am getting a helper to clean the tank treads an I gotta show him the ropes. I gone on out to the motor pool an they is a feller standin there starin down at a tread got about a hundrit pounds of mud on it.
“Say, you the new guy?” I ast.
When he turn around, I almost fainted dead away! It is ole Sergeant Kranz from Vietnam an the army base where me an Mister McGivver collected the garbage for our pigs! Cept I noticed right away, Sergeant Kranz, he ain’t a sergeant major no more—he is only a buck private.
“Oh, no” is the first thing out of his mouth when he sees me.
It seems that Sergeant Kranz blames me for the misfortune of being busted from sergeant-major to private, though even a moron like me can see he is stretchin things a bit.
What had happened was this: After me an Mister McGivver got out of the pig bidness, Sergeant Kranz decided that the army could actually sell their garbage to pig farmers all over the area, an after a while they had so much money they didn’t know what to do with it. So he suggested they use it to build a new officers’ club, an the general was so pleased with this he put Sergeant Kranz in charge of buildin the new club.
On the day of the grand openin, they had a big celebration, with bands an free drinks an all, an to cap it off at the end of the evenin, they had hired a striptease dancer all the way from Australia to do her thing on the stage. Said she was not only the best stripper in Australia, she was the best stripper in the world.
Anyhow, the officers’ club was mobbed so’s you could barely see the stripper, an at some point the general hissef got up on a table in the back of the room to get a better look. However, it seems Sergeant Kranz has installed the ceilin fans about a foot lower than normal, an when the general stands up on the table, it got him in the head. Scalped him, just like a Indian might do.
The general was furious, hollerin an yellin about “How am I gonna explain this to my wife?” An, of course, he blames Sergeant Kranz an has him busted on the spot an sent here, to the dirtiest job in the army.
“I was one of the first black soldiers to make it to the top of the enlisted ranks in this man’s army,” he says, “but it seems like ever time I get around you, Gump, there is some kind of shit fixin to go on.”
I tell him I’m sorry, but that it don’t exactly seem fair to blame me for what happened.
“Yeah, probly you’re right, Gump. It’s just that I put in twenty-eight years of a thirty-year hitch, only to find mysef spendin my final time as a buck private,” he says. “Somebody got to be responsible—that’s the way it is in the army. Couldn’t of been me, else how do you explain that I worked my way up to the highest enlisted rank in the army?”
“Maybe you was just lucky,” I says. “I mean, at least you got to be a sergeant for a long time. Me, I have always been at the bottom of the shit heap.”
“Yeah,” he says, “maybe so. Anyway, it don’t matter anymore, I guess. An besides, it was almost worth it.”
“What was?” I ast.
“Seein the fan give that old bastid a flattop,” he says.
Anyhow, me an Sergeant Kranz have got our work cut out for us. Seems like the division is always on maneuvers, an the mud is two feet deep. We are scrapin an hoein an shovelin an hosin mud from daylight to dark. When we get back to the barracks, we is too dirty to let inside, an they make us hose off in the cold.
Sergeant Kranz, when he talks at all, mostly talks about Vietnam, which, for some reason, he remembers fondly.
“Yeah, Gump, them was the good old days,” he says. “A real war—not this police-action crap they got goin for us now. Man, we had tanks and howitzers and bombers could sure bring down a load of pee on the enemy.”
“Seems like they brought down a load of pee on us, too, sometimes,” I say.
“Yeah, well, that the way it is. In war, people are gonna get killed. That’s why it’s called a war.”
“I never kilt nobody,” I says.
“What! How you know that?”
“Well, I don’t think I did. I never done fired my weapon but once or twice, an then it was just at bushes or somethin.”
“That ain’t nothin to be proud of, Gump. In fact, you oughta be ashamed of yoursef.”
“Well, what about Bubba?” I ast.
“What about him? Who was that?”
“My friend. He got kilt.”
“Oh, yeah, I remember now—the one you went out after. Well, he probably done somethin stupid.”