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"Except that that never happens, and this does," Eddie said. He felt the same as Chuck. They loved each other, but they did not mind looking at naked sailors.
Now all seven hundred marines were getting off the ship and onto land as fast as they could. The same was happening at eight other locations along this stretch of coast. As soon as a landing craft emptied out, it lost no time in turning around and coming back for more, but the process still seemed desperately slow.
The Japanese artillery gunner, hidden somewhere in the jungle, found his range at last, and to Chuck's shock a well-aimed shell exploded in a knot of marines, sending men and rifles and body parts flying through the air to litter the beach and stain the sand red.
Chuck was staring in horror at the carnage when he heard the roar of a plane, and looked up to see a Japanese Zero flying low, following the coast. The red suns painted on the wings struck fear into his heart. Last time he saw that sight had been at the Battle of Midway.
The Zero strafed the beach. Marines who were in the process of disembarking from landing craft were caught defenseless. Some threw themselves flat in the shallows, some tried to get behind the hull of the boat, some ran for the jungle. For a few seconds blood spurted and men fell.
Then the plane was gone, leaving the beach scattered with American dead.
Chuck heard it open up a moment later, strafing the next beach.
It would be back.
There were supposed to be U.S. planes in attendance, but he could not see any. Air support was never where you wanted it to be, which was directly above your head.
When all the marines were ashore, alive and dead, the boats transported medics and stretcher parties to the beach. Then they began landing supplies: ammunition, drinking water, food, drugs, and dressings. On the return trip the landing craft brought the wounded back to the ship.
Chuck and Eddie, as nonessential personnel, went ashore with the supplies.
The boat skippers had got used to the swell now, and their craft held a stable position, with its ramp on the sand and the waves breaking on its stern, while the boxes were unloaded and Chuck and Eddie jumped into the surf to wade to shore.
They reached the waterline together.
As they did so, a machine gun opened up.
It seemed to be in the jungle about four hundred yards along the beach. Had it been there all along, the gunner biding his time, or had it just been moved into position from another location? Eddie and Chuck bent double and ran for the tree line.
A sailor with a crate of ammunition on his shoulder gave a shout of pain and fell, dropping the box.
Then Eddie cried out.
Chuck ran on two paces before he could stop. When he turned, Eddie was rolling on the sand clutching his knee, yelling: "Ah, fuck!"
Chuck came back and knelt beside him. "It's okay, I'm here!" he shouted. Eddie's eyes were closed, but he was alive, and Chuck could see no wounds other than the knee.
He glanced up. The boat that had brought them was still close to shore, being unloaded. He could get Eddie back to the ship in minutes. But the machine gun was still firing.
He got into a crouching position. "This is going to hurt," he said. "Yell as much as you like."
He got his right arm under Eddie's shoulder, then slid his left under Eddie's thighs. He took the weight and straightened up. Eddie screamed with pain as his smashed leg swung free. "Hang in there, buddy," Chuck said. He turned toward the water.
He felt sudden, unbearably sharp pains in his legs, his back, and finally his head. In the next fraction of a second he thought he must not drop Eddie. A moment later he knew he was going to. There was a flash of light behind his eyes that rendered him blind.
And then the world came to an end.
v
On her day off, Carla worked at the Jewish Hospital.
Dr. Rothmann had persuaded her. He had been released from the camp--no one knew why, except the Nazis, and they did not tell anyone. He had lost one eye and he walked with a limp, but he was alive, and capable of practising medicine.
The hospital was in the northern working-class district of Wedding, but there was nothing proletarian about the architecture. It had been built before the First World War, when Berlin's Jews had been prosperous and proud. There were seven elegant buildings set in a large garden. The different departments were linked by tunnels, so that patients and staff could move from one to another without braving the weather.
It was a miracle there was still a Jewish hospital. Very few Jews were left in Berlin. They had been rounded up in their thousands and sent away in special trains. No one knew where they had gone or what happened to them. There were incredible rumors about extermination camps.
The few Jews still in Berlin could not be treated, if they were sick, by Aryan doctors and nurses. So, by the tangled logic of Nazi racism, the hospital was allowed to remain. It was mainly staffed by Jews and other unfortunate people who did not count as properly Aryan: Slavs from eastern Europe, people of mixed ancestry, and those married to Jews. But there were not enough nurses, so Carla helped out.
