The Anarchist

The soldiers of the Army Specialized Training Corps 'fell out' from the attractive red brick Fraternity House, modeled after an English manor, for roll call. Their tan cotton uniforms were clean and pressed, thanks to regular and free laundry service and their overseas caps were tilted rakishly on the sides of their young heads.

Their faces and names represented the triumph of the American melting pot and American democracy: Slav, Teuton, Scandinavian, Anglo-Saxon, Southern European, and Jew responded to old names from old civilizations and to new streamlined names, artificial Americanized names which eliminated difficulties of pronunciation or erased national origins.

The day promised to be a beautiful one, judging from the color and temperature of the sun's rays; and the green grass and red geraniums, which decorated the lawn perimetered by a low stone wall and concrete pavement, were still wet with dew. But when the dew evaporated and the colors blazed, the scene would seem like some painter's improvement on Nature.

' I met an interesting girl Saturday night,' Stratton Demos said to Jack, whom he referred to occasionally as Jacques La Strap.

Jack's greenish oriental eyes, tinted ages ago in some herdsman's tent in Jerusalem, took on a wicked light: ' Was she good looking?' His narrow lips opened wide, in a wolfish smile. No one, except a recently married man such as Jack, who had forsaken the delights that Woman offered, in the abstract, could appreciate more the sorcery in hair, breast, and thigh that seemed to lie everywhere but in one's wife.

' I wouldn't say she was good looking. She is a blonde though, a green-eyed blonde. But nothing to write home about.' He could see from Jack's eyes that Jack considered Joyce ' good looking ' sight unseen, just from the words green-eyed blonde. Stratton's own appreciation increased. ' She is different,' Stratton continued. ' You'll meet her.'

The march down the streets of Berkeley commenced. Someone began singing: ' I'm aworking on a railroad....'

Instantly everyone took up the song, and soon the group was bellowing: ' Someone's in the kitchen, I know-ow-ow.'

On the campus, Stratton's eyes followed the tops of the tall graceful evergreen tress into the cloudless skies, and then to the white Campanile, whose bells began ringing melodiously. Everything was so unbearably beautiful. Stratton's heart leapt up. Such a lovely day: it belonged to him. Time, a short time, was the only commodity he really possessed. It would be a crime to waste this day playing soldier.

When the platoon neared the Library, Stratton made up his mind. ' I'm taking off,' he said to Jack. ' Cover for me at Gym, if you can.' He hoped they wouldn't practice abandoning ship in the swimming pool by jumping off the high diving board. Jack couldn't jump twice. That was too much to ask. In practicing Judo, the Greek wouldn't miss him. He could lie on the mat with someone else. As for the asinine physical fitness Swedes, direct from Sweden, they were too naive to know the time of day. His fellow soldiers dismissed him as a hopeless nut, a fuck-up.

When the platoon approached Wheeler Hall, Stratton broke away from the marching column and ran into the building, where he hid in the doorway. He waited till the marching column was out of sight. He didn't mind missing breakfast. In fact, there was no necessity to go hungry. With that thought, he sallied forth from Wheeler Hall and hurried downhill toward the YMCA, where the USO had coffee and pastry usually available for servicemen who might drift in from one of the many military establishments in the Bay Area.

Being the only serviceman there, Demos received prompt attention, and he disposed of his breakfast in a matter of minutes. Then he gathered up several daily papers and two new magazines and settled himself in a wicker chair, on whose seat was a worn pad. He studied a military map. The German generals Dietl, Kuchler, Kluge, Manstein and Kleist were arrayed against the Russian generals Meretskov, Govorov, Timoshenko, Konev, Golikov, Vatutin and Tulienev. Surely the gods played with men, like swatting flies. Who would remember these generals?

He tried to recall the generals Julius Caesar had fought and only one name, Vercingetorix came to his mind because the name stuck in his mind like atlatl, a Mayan weapon, in crossword puzzles.

The Russians were pleading for a second front, Izvestia announced that without a second front victory was impossible, the Government had created a Veteran's Administration Rehabilitation Service so as not to repeat the shame of apple- selling by former heroes, or tanks being moved against unemployed men in the nation's capital.