Embarkation is in progress. No smoking is
allowed anywhere. Everyone entering the ship is triply checked, to make sure
he belongs there, and the loading is very quiet. There is only the shuffle of
tired feet on the stairways and quiet orders. The permanent crew of military
police know every move. They have handled this problem of traffic before.
The tennis courts on the upper deck are a
half-acre of sleeping men now—men, feet, and equipment. MPs are everywhere, on
stairs and passages, directing and watching. This embarkation must go on
smoothly, for one little block might well lose hours in the loading, just as
one willful driver, making a wrong turn in traffic, may jam an avenue for a
long time. But in spite of the shuffling gait, the embarkation is very rapid.
About midnight the last man is aboard.
In the staff room the commanding officer sits
behind a long table, with telephones in front of him. His adjutant, a tired
blond major, makes his report and places his papers on the table. The CO nods
and gives him an order.
Throughout the ship the loudspeakers howl.
Embarkation is complete. The gangways slide down from the ship. The iron doors
close. No one can enter or leave the ship now, except the pilot. On the bridge
the captain of the ship paces slowly. It is his burden now. These thousands are
in his care, and if there is an accident it will be his blame.
The ship remains against the pier and a light
breathing sound comes from deep in her. The troops are cut off now and gone
from home, although they are not a hundred steps from home. On the upper decks
a few men lean over the rails and look down on the pier and away at the city
behind. The oily water ripples with the changing tide. It is almost time to go.
In the staff room, which used to be the ship’s theater, the commanding officer
sits behind his table. His tired, blond adjutant sits beside him. The phone
rings, the CO picks it up, listens for a moment and hangs up the receiver. He
turns to the adjuntant.
“All ready,” he says.
SOMEWHERE IN ENGLAND, June 21, 1943—The
tide is turning now and it is after midnight. On the bridge, which towers above
the pier buildings, there is great activity. The lines are cast off and the
engines reversed. The great ship backs carefully into the stream and nearly
fills it to both banks. But the little tugs are waiting for her and they bump
and persuade her about until she is headed right and they hang beside her like
suckling ships as she moves slowly toward the sea. Only the MPs on watch among
the sleeping soldiers see the dimmed-out city slipping by.
Down deep in the ship, in the hospital, the
things that can happen to so many men have started to happen. A medical major has
taken off his blouse and rolled up his sleeves. He is washing his hands in
green soap, while an Army nurse in operating uniform stands by, holding the
doctor’s white gown. The anonymous soldier, with the dangerous appendix, is
having his stomach shaved by another Army nurse. Brilliant light floods the
operating table. The doctor major slips into his sterile gloves. The nurse
adjusts the mask over his nose and mouth and he steps quickly to the sleeping
soldier on the table under the light.
The great troopship sneaks past the city and
the tugs leave her, a dark thing steaming into the dark. On the decks and in
the passages and in the bunks the thousands of men are collapsed in sleep. Only
their faces show under the dim blue blackout lights—faces and an impression of
tangled hands and feet and legs and equipment. Officers and military police
stand guard over this great sleep, a sleep multiplied, the sleep of thousands.
An odor rises from the men, the characteristic odor of an army. It is the smell
of wool and the bitter smell of fatigue and the smell of gun oil and leather.
Troops always have this odor. The men lie sprawled, some with their mouths
open, but they do not snore. Perhaps they are too tired to snore, but their
breathing is a pulsing, audible thing.
The tired blond adjutant haunts the deck like a
ghost. He doesn’t know when he will ever sleep again. He and the provost
marshal share responsibility for a smooth crossing, and both are serious and
responsible men.
