W E B Griffin - BoW 04 - The Colonels

by The Colonels(Lit)

  Later Jannier had gone to Algeria, which is where he had known Greer.

  More important, he was a paratrooper. That, of course, said a lot about him. There was no way that a guy like Jannier was going to make a pass at Melody. Which was a good thing, because any female who went around showing off her boobs in a low-cut dress like Melody was wearing had to expect somebody to make a grab for them widow or no widow.

  Melody wasn't the only one with her teats on display. There were acres of boobs around tonight. Christ, even Jane Cassidy, who was a real lady, had hers on display. That was the last thing he had expected of her.

  Mac looked down from the balcony at the dance floor again. Lowell was dancing there with Jane Cassidy; and Mac wondered what her husband thought about that. But at least Lowell was on his good behavior. He was dancing with Mrs. Cassidy like he was a bishop and she was a nun.

  The lights began to flicker, and Mac wondered what the fuck that was all about, and then he heard people starting to count backward from fifteen. He looked at his watch.

  Goddamn, it's midnight already. Roxy was on the other side of the table, next to Colonel Tim F. Brandon. She stood up when Mac stood up and reached out for his hand.

  "Happy New Year, Colonel," she said. When they finished counting backward and the lights went off, she leaned across the table and kissed him.

  "Yeah, you too, Roxy," Mac said. Then they started to sing

  "Auld Lang Sync," and Roxy straightened up.

  "Don't I get a New Year's kiss?" Colonel Tim F. Brandon asked.

  Roxy Macmillan gave him her cheek, but the fat sonofabitch weaved his head and kissed her on the lips and wouldn't let go until she pushed him away.

  Mac glowered at the sonofabitch while they sang

  "Auld Lang Sync." The fat chair borne fucker kept putting his arm around Roxy, trying to hug her.

  When they'd finished singing, Colonel Tim F. Brandon offered his hand to Macmillan across the table.

  "Keep your fucking hands off my wife, Brandon!"

  Colonel Brandon looked shocked and angry, for Mac had spoken so loud that others were watching them.

  "Now see here, Macmillan!" he said. "See here, shit!" Macmillan replied. A wave of rage swept through him.

  Lieutenant Colonel Rudolph G. Macmillan hit Colonel Tim

  F. Brandon with his right fist. He hit him squarely, with the skill he had demonstrated when as a sergeant he had been

  All-Pacific boxing champion. Colonel Brandon, his lip cut, his nose already beginning to bleed, fell backward against the balcony railing.

  There was a ripping sound as the railing tore loose. Then Colonel Brandon, realizing he was falling, screamed.

  "Oh, Mac," Roxy said. "You dumb sonofabitch, you!"

  (Three)

  Out of habit someone called out

  "Medic," but the medical staff tables were in the cafeteria, and the first physician to respond to the call was Antoinette Parker, M. D." who had been on the dance floor with her husband.

  Phil Parker ran interference for his wife. When Lowell saw him shoving his way through the crowd, and then glanced up at the balcony and realized that whoever had fallen from the balcony was from CDO, Lowell left Jane Cassidy on the dance floor and headed for the crowd of people under the balcony.

  As soon as he saw that it was Colonel Tim F. Brandon, he suspected that Brandon had not fallen accidentally from the balcony. He looked up and met Bob Bellmon's angry, resigned eyes.

  Bellmon cupped his hands: "Do what you can, Lowell!"

  Lowell nodded.

  He squeezed through the last line of spectators and dropped to his knees beside Toni. From somewhere, she had an ammonia ampule. She broke it and put it under Brandon's nose. He woke with a start.

  "Don't move, Colonel," Toni said, reassuringly, "until we see if you've broken anything."

  Brandon saw Lowell.

  "Major Lowell," Colonel Brandon ordered, "have that sonofabitch Macmillan arrested. Have him put behind bars, right now. I'll bring the charges." "Take it easy, Colonel," Lowell said. "You'll be all right."

  "I gave you an order, goddamn it, Major!"

  "Yes, sir," Lowell said. "I heard-it."

  There were other doctors on the scene now, one of whom rudely pulled Lowell out of the way.

  The physicians held a hasty conference, the consensus of which was not to move Brandon until they could get an ambulance team to the club. The team could put him into something Lowell didn't understand and immobilize him.

  It took the ambulance about five minutes to arrive, five minutes during which Brandon was alternately in a rage against Macmillan and terrified that he had broken his back. Lowell, at first contemptuous, told himself that he would behave no differently in the circumstances.

  Someone called his name and he turned and someone thrust a drink in his hand.

  "You look like you can use one, Major Lowell," a complete stranger said.

  After the ambulance crew had strapped Colonel Brandon to a plywood board that immobilized him completely (and further terrified him), they lifted the board onto a stretcher. The doctors looked on disinterestedly. Carrying stretchers, Lowell thought, was obviously beneath their dignity.

  "You," Lowell said, pointing to a young lieutenant, "lend a hand with the stretcher." He and the lieutenant helped the enlisted men carry the stretcher out of the ballroom, through the foyer, and down the stairs to an ambulance backed up to the club. Its doors were open and its emergency lights were flashing.

  "My wife will have to be notified," Colonel Brandon said. "God knows what that will do to her!"

  "As soon as we get to the hospital, sir," Lowell said, "I'll get on the phone and explain the situation. I'll stay with you, sir."

  When he started to get in the back of the ambulance with him, the medical officer, a young captain who was probably annoyed at being on duty on New Year's Eve, put his hand on his arm and stopped him.

  "Medical personnel only, Major," he said, officiously.

  "I'm going," Lowell said. "Get this show on the road, Doctor."

  "You are nor going, Major," the medical officer said. Get in the ambulance, chancre mechanic, and shut your mouth," Lowell said.

  "It's all right, Doctor," Toni Parker said. "I asked Major Lowell to accompany the patient."

  The doctor's face tightened, but he went around and got in the front beside the driver.

  "I'll see you at the hospital," Toni said to Lowell. "I can't let Phil drive."

  She slammed the door, and the ambulance, siren howling, headed for the hospital.

  (Four)

  Married Officers' Quarters

  U.S. Army Hospital

  Fort Rucker, Alabama 0215 Hours, 1 January 1959

  When Lowell called Bellmon's quarters, the phone was answered before the second ring.

  "General Bellmon," the voice said.

  "Lowell, sir," he said. "I've just spoken with Dr. Parker. Colonel Brandon has a cracked shoulder blade, which will require a cast. He has also suffered some torn muscles and ligaments and various bruises and contusions. But there is no damage to the spine, and he should be up and walking in a couple of days."

  "I'm sure Mrs. Brandon will be greatly relieved when I call her back," Bellmon said.

  "So, I'm sure, will Mrs. Macmillan," Lowell said.

  Bellmon ignored that.

  "Thank you, Lowell, for staying on top of this," he said.

  "General, I have been ordered by Colonel Brandon to have Mac placed under arrest. It is the colonel's intention to bring charges."

  "You have brought the matter to my attention, Lowell," Bellmon said.

  "What do I tell the wounded elephant?" Lowell asked.

  "You tell Colonel Brandon, Major Lowell," Bellmon said icily, "that you have brought his wishes to my attention."

  "I tried to talk to him, Bob," Lowell said. "He is still greatly pissed."

  "I'll see you tomorrow, Major," Bellmon said, coldly. "Thank you again for what you have done."


  The telephone went dead in Lowell's ear.

  "One suspects," Lowell said, picking up his glass and smiling at Phil Parker, "that one should not have referred to the victim of this brutal assault as "the wounded elephant." One gathers from his famous icy tones that General Bellmon considers this an affront to good military order and discipline." "Screw "em," Phil Parker said, drunkenly amiable.

  "My sentiments, exactly" Lowell said. "I guess I better call Roxy and get her off the hook."

  "I'll call her, Craig," Toni Parker said. "You go home."

  "Tis but the shank of the evening," Lowell said. "Phil and I have just about solved all of the army's problems." "Go home, Craig," Toni said. "Before you fall down." "Well, if I didn't know better," Lowell said, mincingly, "I'd think I wasn't wanted."

  Parker laughed.

  "Oh, God, I'll have to drive you home," Toni said. "Your car isn't here." She chuckled. "Not that you'd be capable of driving it if it was."

  "Where is it?" Lowell said, as if that information came as a great surprise.

  "You loaned it to Bill Franldin."

  "So I did," Lowell said, remembering.

  "Where's your cape and your hat?" Toni asked.

  "At the club," Lowell replied, after he'd thought that over. He was just sober enough to decide that if he couldn't remember where he'd left his car, his cape, and his hat, he had had more to drink than he should have.

  There were two telephones on the table in the living room. One was an outside (post) line, and the other an internal hospital line. He picked up the hospital line.

  "Duty officer," he said. A sleepy sergeant came on the line.

  "Sergeant, this is Major Lowell. Is there some reason your staff car can't run me to my quarters?" He listened briefly, and then added: "I'll be right there. Thank you, Sergeant."

  "Now you can proceed immediately with your lecherous plans for my friend," he said to Toni.

  "Good night, Craig," she said. "Can you find the front desk by yourself, or will I have to show you?" "Good night, Doctor," he said, and kissed her cheek. "And thank you."

  He leered at Phil Parker. "Et bonne chasse, mon ami!"

  It was a surprisingly long walk from the Parkers' quarters to the front entrance to the hospital. And when he got there, Jane Cassidy was waiting for him, sitting in one of the plastic and chrome armchairs with her fur jacket over her shoulders. He felt his heart beat.

  "I knew you would need a ride," she said, getting to her feet when she saw him. "You told me you gave your car keys to Mr. Franidin."

  "I see I won't be needing you, Sergeant," Lowell said to the driver of the staff car. "Sorry to get you up."

  "No problem, sir."

  He had a very clear memory of Jane Cassidy's tongue against his, his erection stiff against her belly, the moment before Macmillan had sent Colonel Brandon flying through the balcony rail.

  I am very drunk, he told himself, but not too drunk to recognize this as a very dangerous situation.

  "How is Colonel Brandon?" Jane asked, as soon as she led him to her car, a Buick coupe.

  "He's got a cracked shoulder blade," Lowell said. "We were afraid he'd hurt his spine, but the X-rays say not."

  "That's good," Jane said.

  She got behind the wheel and started the engine; but she did not put the car in gear or turn on the lights.

  "You weren't really surprised to see me, were you?" she asked. "Here, I mean?" "I was" he said, truthfully. "But now that you're here, no."

  "I don't have in mind what you think I do," she said. "I don't cheat on my husband. I never have, and I don't want to." "OK," he said.

  He realized that he was deeply disappointed.

  "After what happened at the club," she said, "I got in my car and started home."

  "Why didn't you keep going?"

  "Because I knew this had to be settled now," she said. "Right away."

  "What had to be settled? A semi-innocent kiss?" "You want me," she said. He didn't reply. "And I... respond... to you," Jane Cassidy said.

  "We are adults," Lowell said, "who can behave ourselves."

  "I don't think so," she said. "That's why I came back." "I thought you just said you don't cheat on your husband."

  "There's always to be a first time," she said. "If I'm around you, there would be a first time."

  "Jane, I'm a little drunk, and I don't know what you're talking about."

  "I don't want to work for you anymore," she said.

  "Oh," he said.

  "Oh, what?"

  "Oh, if you ask for a transfer, everyone will believe with cause that it is because I have made a pass at you.

  "I hadn't thought about that," she said.

  "And I have just had a speech from General Jiggs about my relationships with married women," he said.

  She laughed.

  "What's funny?"

  "You don't fit the image of innocent victim," she said. "I'll go see Roberts and tell him I think you're very nice, and very intelligent, but you just aren't working out," Lowell said.

  "OK," she said, without enthusiasm.

  "I'll make it clear that I think highly of you, but that I need someone with more experience. You can't be blamed for not having experience." "If I had experience," Jane said, "I would be handling this better than I am, wouldn't I?"

  "I think you're doing very well," he said.

  "Damn you!" she said furiously.

  "For what?" he asked, after a moment.

  "For not trying to overcome my objections," she said. "For understanding. For not making a pass."

  "Do you want me to make a pass?"

  "If you gave me a chance to slap you, that would make things a lot easier," she said.

  She looked at him. Even in the darkness he could see her eyes. He moved across the seat to her, slowly but surely, so that she understood his intention, and would have time to put the headlights on and put the car in gear.

  He put his hand on her cheek and then kissed her. She didn't respond at first, but then her mouth opened and her tongue ouched his. He let his hand move to her neck, and then inside The fur coat. The moment his fingers touched the first swell of her breast, she pushed him away furiously.

  She pulled the lights on, jammed the Buick in gear, and backed out of the parking lot.

  Lowell leaned back against the seat, furious. Simply talking with her had brought the erection back. Kissing her, and the first touch of her breasts, had aroused him.

  With difficulty, he restrained himself from telling her that what she had done was known as cock teasing

  They approached his BOQ.

  "There it is," he said. "You can just drop me in front."

  She passed the BOQ without slowing.

  "You passed my BOQ," he repeated.

  "Just shut up," she said.

  As they drove off the post, he asked, "Is it permitted to ask where we're going?"

  She didn't reply for a moment.

  "When you sent me to settle your bill at the Daleville Inn," she said, "do you remember what I told you?"

  "No," he said, honestly.

  "I told you they told me you had taken the suite for two weeks, and a bargain was a bargain, no refunds."

  He took her meaning. "By now, certainly," he said, "they have rented it out to someone else." "No," Jane Cassidy said, as they approached the motel. "No, they haven't. I kept the key. At the time, I didn't want to think why I kept it." She drove into the motel, past the office, to a parking spot by the door to the suite. She stopped the car with a squeal of brakes and got out without saying anything. She went to the door and took the key from her purse. He saw that her hands were shaking. She finally got the door open, and he followed her inside. She slammed the door and shrugged out of her fur jacket and turned to him.

  VII

  "For God's sake, hurry!" she said.

  (One) The Daleville Inn 0320 Hours, 1 January 19S9

  The phone rang so long that Lowell was just about to hang up before t
here was a click and a sleepy voice:

  "Warrant Officer Franldin."

  "I need a ride, Bill," Lowell said.