The Long Green Shore Read Online Free PDF Page A

them, and harangued and threatened them. Then they marched again—and again, and again. They marched. They swung their arms and moved their feet, but with a stubborn mediocrity. It could not be attacked as a deliberate and insolent slovenliness, but it was still quite obvious.
    The strange duel went on. A clash between a sullen and savage man with the immense mumbo power of discipline and rank behind him, and the vast, silent, stubborn and tangible anger of a thousand men who would have forgiven him many worse things, but could not forgive him shooting two dogs.
    And in the end, Connell was beaten and dismissed them. When they broke from their parades there was a strange feeling of triumph and elation through the camp. The lines were filled with voices louder than usual and wild carolling ho-ho-hos and laughter rang through the trees. And the voices and the laughter fell on Connell like a black rain and burned him like acid.
    So they called him Killer Connell.
    Young Rocky Bennet was foolish enough to write the story of the shooting of the dogs in a letter home. The officer censoring the mail—old Suck’n See Seaton—took it to Connell, who gave Rocky twenty-eight days field punishment.
    Lieutenant-Colonel Connell splashed a small quantity of soda into the glass and tossed off the whisky. He and Doc Maguire were sitting at the small table in Connell’s cabin—the whisky bottle was three-parts empty.
    â€˜They hate me, Doc,’ said Connell. ‘That’s the way I want them to feel.’
    He stared for a moment at the empty glass as he put it down on the table. There was a hard, thin, sensual line round his mouth and nostrils. His pale, harsh blue eyes were a trifle bloodshot and puffiness under the eyes and the nervous skin over the strong Gothic bone of his face showed dissipation and sleeplessness and nerves rubbed raw.
    â€˜Men who are happy and contented and well fed don’t fight well, Doc,’ he said. ‘I want ’em lean and hungry and hating me and themselves and everyone else in the world. Then they’ll fight! And these boys of mine are going to fight, by Jesus!’
    He poured himself another drink and the Doc, who tossed his tot off at one gulp when Connell reached for the bottle, pushed his own glass over for a refill. The Doc never talked much when he was drinking.
    â€˜You know, Doc,’ said Connell, ‘I was bloody near a breakdown on the Tablelands. A man’s a fool the way he gets hold of some slut and wears himself out on her…’ He sneered at the memory. ‘Christ! It doesn’t make you feel good. It doesn’t make you feel happy or forget. Whoring and drinking. What’s the reason, Doc? Why does a man do it?’
    â€˜I don’t know, Cliff,’ said the Doc. ‘I’m no psychologist.’
    Connell looked at him and his mouth twisted: ‘No, you’re no psychologist. You’re not even much of a doctor—a whisky soak—a drunken quack—the pox doctor’s clerk.’
    Doc Maguire looked at him steadily, a little blankly. The spirit was starting to work now and he felt the calmly sullen detachment of his drunkenness. He never got falling-down drunk, the Doc—his voice just got a bit slower and more considered and he would stare steadily. The tiny scarlet threads of veins in his cheeks grew brighter, and nothing mattered, nothing touched him.
    â€˜How do you reckon you’ll go in action the first time, Doc?’ sneered Connell. ‘It’ll be a bit harder than you’re used to—harder than sitting in the mess all night soaking whisky and then getting up next morning to dish out a few cascara tablets and aspirin.’
    Maguire contemplated Connell and licked his lips slowly. ‘You watch your own guts, Cliff,’ he said casually. ‘I’ll watch mine. I’ll be all right. I’ll be there when I’m wanted. You smash ’em up—I’ll patch