The harbor’s a blue crescent with miles of sere jetties snaking around each other like diagrams of dance steps. One of them’s covered with worn stumps of ancient bastions and next to it a French battleship lies half-sunk, still piping smoke and steam into the air. All around it, the ships of Operation Torch are unloading shit faster than you can believe. Cargo nets rise from the holds of the transports and splat onto the quays like giant loogies. Longshoremen haul, trucks carry, troops march, French girls smoke Yankee cigarettes, Algerians propose joint ventures.