"Incidentally, you might like to know that Sergeant Samuels caught an error in your birth date-someone had typed in 1904! The correction's been passed up lines."
He dismissed Macurdy then, and the once self-made warlord oЈ Yuulith's Rude Lands, now a buck private, left wondering why he'd declined to volunteer for OCS.
But over the next several weeks, he wasn't even tempted to change his mind. He'd learned long ago to trust his intuitions. Someday they might lead him into something he'd regret, but so far… He paused to review a few of them: marrying Varia, following the old conjure woman up Injun Knob, beating up Zassfel and his bullies in the House of Heroes, invading the Ylvin marches… He'd felt regret a few times-a time or two almost more than he could handle-but things had worked out. He wasn't going to change the way he operated now.
In their tenth week, at the end of a training day, an unfamiliar officer addressed the company before they were dismissed. On his blouse he wore a stylized silver parachute with wings, and on his overseas cap, a large patch with a parachute symbol. Instead of an officers neat oxford shoes, or rough G.I. clodhoppers and lace-up canvas leggings, he wore boots that gleamed like polished teak.
The officer told them that parachute regiments were being formed. The requirements for joining were stringent, but if you were accepted, and if you made it through the training, you'd be in one of the toughest outfits in the world, outfits that would be given the most difficult assignments. And in addition to the regular pay for your rank you'd earn fifty dollars a month jump pay. "Any of you who are interested," he concluded, "be at the orderly room at 2000 hours." Macurdy's guts had tightened like a fiddle string, and he felt a powerful, Inexplicable, even shocking desire to volunteer. My God! he told himself, this isn't something for you! You're a married man!
The announcement dominated conversation in the showers and mess line that evening. Mostly the talk was of the supposed near certainty of getting killed, and the fifty dollar a month bonus-a bonus twice the base pay of an ordinary buck private: "Talk about sitting ducks! The fucking krauts (or japs) will be shooting at you all the way down. Anyone who'd volunteer for that kind of bullshit is out of their fucking mind." And "the extra money's for your funeral."
At 2000 hours, Macurdy and twelve others were at B Company's orderly room. He was, he told himself, just there to hear more about it. From there they were marched to a nearby lecture shed, where some thirty-five candidates from the battalion's other companies also were gathered. There the parachute officer described the training; it made infantry training sound leisurely. When he'd finished his description, he asked how many were still interested. Some thirty held up their hands.
"All right," he said, "the men who raised their hands remain seated. The rest of you fall in outside and wait at ease." When the others had left, the men who'd raised their hands were lined up in front and ordered to "drop down and prepare to do twenty-five pushups. GOOD pushups! Airborne pushups! None of that halfway crap! Your sergeants will be watching. Anyone who cheats will be on company punishment. Now! By the numbers!" And he began to count, pausing now and then to shout "Touch those chins to the floor! All the way! All the way! Straighten those arms! Get those butts in line! Sergeant, take that man's name! The one with his ass in the air like a goddamn tent ridge!"
In spite of getting little serious exercise during his years as a deputy, Macurdy hadn't lost much strength. What he had lost was condition, endurance. But during nine weeks of infantry training, he'd gotten a great deal of exercise, and his endurance was at least as good as it had ever been. After reaching twenty-five, the officer had continued to count, for those who were still pumping. Macurdy, despite his two hundred seventeen pounds, had lasted through fifty-eight. Only two had surpassed. The seemingly tireless Shorty Lyle, from Macurdy's squad, was still grinding them out when the officer stopped counting at one hundred.
When Shorty was on his feet again, the officer put his hand on the trainee's shoulder. "This," he said, "is the kind of man we're looking for." But obviously didn't require, because all nineteen who'd done twenty-five had their names taken down; they were accepted. Seven were from B Company.
They were all pleased with themselves. Shorty Lyle was a bit miffed, though, that the officer hadn't kept counting, so he could show how many he could do.
12
Jump School
The airborne volunteers left for Fort Benning on June 6, 1942. Though they didn't know it, 2nd Battalion of the 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment had just shipped to England, the first airborne outfit to go overseas. Several other parachute regiments were in training, and in mid-August, the 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions would officially be formed, and begin theirs. The armed forces were shifting out of military conservatism, trying new methods.
At Fort Benning, as at Camp Robinson, assignment to squads was alphabetical. Thus Macurdy and Shorty Lyle were in the same squad again. Even more than Macurdy, the flamboyant Shorty-five feet four and one hundred forty extremely muscular pounds--caught the attention of the airborne training cadre because he was tough, cocky, and seemingly fearless. He was twenty years old, had been a high school track and field star, a member of a local gymnastics club since age ten, and a sometime Golden Gloves boxer who'd spent two years in the CCC. They were an odd pair. Macurdy large, mild-mannered, and seemingly deliberate, Lyle smi, flamboyant, and impulsive.
The first week of training was the most grueling; fewer than forty percent got through it, the rest being shipped back to whatever command they'd come from. And the daily four hours in the physical training pits weren't the end of it. They ran everywhere they went-would as long as they were there pausing on command to drop down and pump out twentyfive pushups. Even in the packing hangar, where they learned to pack their own chutes, they were stopped frequently to "give me twenty-five." The man who, on leaving the mess hall, wasn't tanning on his first stride out the door, regardless how full his stomach, might be ordered to "give me fifty," an order few could meet, though a clean thirty-five might avoid a training gig. All in all, that first week, the trainees probably average at least 700 pushups a day.
Friday was make or break day: The trainees did 1400 side straddle hops, by which time a lot of gigs had been recorded. (A gig-a penalty point was given for failing to complete an exercise; three gigs and you were washed out, eliminated.) Then they lay on their backs, legs straight, booted feet some twenty inches above the ground-and were left like that. Soon little grunts of pain and effort could be heard, with occasional and increasing thuds as heels dropped to the ground. When about half had failed, the order was given to lower their feet.
During the final hour they ran. Running gigs were especially potent; each one got double value. And while the trainees were used to fifty-minute runs, this day's was different, with spurts of sprinting-a sort of gruesome interval training in boots-and for the first time, their trainers cycled in and out, taking turns. Well before the fifty minutes were up, men were peeling off to heave their guts, or falling headlong, until the sixty percent wash-out was attained.
In every training exercise, Shorty Lyle excelled, even at running, short-legged though he was. Once, for doin his pushups more rapidly than the count (to get in extras he was ordered onto the demonstration platform and told to "give me twenty-five."
"Which arm?" he asked.
The captain's gaze turned to steel. "Right arm." So he did. That was followed by "now the left," and he did twenty-five of those, too. By that time the captain was grinning like a wolf. Without giving Shorty time to recover, he ordered, "Now fifty with both." Shorty gave him fifty without a struggle, then bounced to his feet The captain put a hand on Shorty's shoulder and turned him to face the other trainees. "Men, take a good look. This is the kind of soldier we want here." Then he sent Shorty back to his place among the others without a word about having mouthed off. The trainees knew for sure now that this was a truly different kind of outfit, and for most of them, the only kind to be part of.