" 'I should imagine,' said Jimmy, 'they'll hold time trials and establish handicaps.
" 'I shouldn't wonder,' I muttered, and at this moment Doggy Moore burst in, obviously upset, just swearing and not defining his unhappiness. When he defined it, even I agreed that the sap was rising. Doggy'd gotten Boom-Boom out of the peculiar parlor the day before, and the first thing he'd done was try to rape Anastasia Higgins."
"Who's Anastasia Higgins?" asked Trapper.
"A boon to all mankind," Hawkeye assured Trapper, "which I pointed out to Doggy. 'I know,' moaned Doggy, 'but Boom-Boom had a great need and he didn't think to ask, so Anastasia thought he was going for her pocketbook. By the time she'd figured it out, she'd made her move and had to stay with it. I got her talked out of making trouble only because, without me, she'd have twenty kids and permanent clap. But, what the hell am I going to do with Boom-Boom?'
" 'Well, Doggy,' I said, 'I got no use for nuts and neurotics but I keep an open mind on screwballs. You got no choice. You gotta take him into your home.'
"I knew Doggy'd taken bigger gambles into his home, so I waited and watched his reaction very carefully.
" 'Make you a deal, Hawkeye,' said Doggy. 'Me and Emma will take him during the week if you and Mary will take him weekends.' "
"And that's why he calls Mary 'Mom,' " said Trapper.
"Yeah. Jesus, when I told Mary she went through the roof. 'Five kids,' she yelled, 'and we're going to have Boom-Boom Benner on weekends. You are out of your mind, and I won't stand for it.'
" 'Boom-Boom will be down Friday night,' I told her. 'I'm sorry, honey, but there isn't a damn thing I can do about it.'
"On the way home that Friday night I picked up the genius and said, 'Boom-Boom, my wife doesn't want you around. We may both get shot when we go through the door.'
" 'Boom-boom,' he said. I had been hoping for more.
" 'You've reached a crossroads in your interesting career,' I told him. 'You are a genius. The question remains whether you are crazy. If you aren't crazy, Doggy and I will arrange an outlet for your big brain. I'll invest one weekend in finding out about you. I got no use for nuts.'
" 'Boom-boom,' he said, and I was figuring him for a real nut, but we drove into the yard, and Billy, who was eight or nine then, ran out and said, 'Hi ya, Boom- Boom. Will you play baseball with me?'
" 'Sure, Billy,' Boom-Boom said."
At this point Dr. Pierce sipped his drink and looked away because, as Trapper John detected, there were tears in his eyes.
"Pardon the emotion," said Hawkeye, "but I can't help it. From that moment on, Mary and I became his parents. We're only what—fifteen or sixteen years older than he—but he'd never really had parents or a home. It was easy. The scholarships came. There was no real expense, and I'm some goddamn proud of him. Sure, I admit he's peculiar in spots, but you don't have any doubt about his ability, or what he can do for us, do you?"
"Hell, no," said Trapper. "As far as I'm concerned, he's number one anywhere and having him here is fantastic good luck. I just wanted the background. How come you never told me about him before he came?"
"I was saving it," said Hawkeye with a grin.
Boom-Boom Benner, proving that he wasn't just lucky, plugged in two more artificial hearts in the week following Halfaman's discharge and rehabilitation. In the midst of his total involvement in the preoperative, operative and postoperative care of these patients, he was bothered by demands that he see patients in the Emergency Room. When the cardiac action died down, Dr. Benner said to Dr. Pierce, "Look, Hawkeye, I want that moron, MacDuff, off my back. I have no intention of covering the Emergency Room, and if that doesn't please you, just tell me, and I'll be on my way."
"Boom-Boom," said Hawk, "keep trying to understand the league. As I've told you, our inner group and Wooden Leg run this joint, but we are dealing with a bunch of lamebrains. They can be managed or faked out, one way or another, but, because they are lamebrains, it's a mistake ever to run at them head-on. When you fake them out, they are sullen because they figure they've been faked out. They don't understand the technique, but they hold still. But him them head-on and they know what to do. Goofus and half the staff would rather make you cover the Emergency Room than save five extra lives a day. That's how their minds work. Once you understand this and adjust to it, it's not a problem."
"It's still a problem to me,", said Boom-Boom. "I hear you talking, but you haven't told me what to do!"
"Obviously," said Hawkeye, "what to do is scare everyone in the Emergency Room witless so they'll leave you alone. Don't resign. Get fired. It's so simple. I don't see why I have to explain it to a genius."
"Boom-boom," said Dr. Benner, and Hawkeye thought he detected challenge and anticipation in his protege's demeanor.
Dr. Benner, while at London Hospital, had been farmed to Peking for a month, where he had allowed his genius to shine upon the Chinese. While in Peking he had become interested, in an amused way, in the technique of acupuncture. This is a very valuable and useful technique based upon an age-old medical dictum which is: Stick needles in a guy every time he complains about something and pretty soon the guy's going to stop complaining.
After his talk with Hawkeye, Boom-Boom went to see Wooden Leg Wilcox, discussed his Emergency Room problem, and suggested that the Emergency Room might provide an opportunity to gain further experience in acupuncture. Mr. Wilcox, who had left his original right leg on Okinawa in 1945 and who was active in the Maine Amputees Association, expressed enthusiastic interest in acupuncture and gave Boom- Boom an ice pick.
A week later, when Dr. Benner was on call, Mr. Wilcox, Chairman of the Board of Directors, brought to the Emergency Room a weekend guest who was having severe abdominal pain, dizzy spells and a splitting headache.
Boom-Boom Benner greeted Mr. Wilcox and the patient, took the history and then asked the nurse to remove the patient's right shoe. Pulling an ice pick from his inside coat pocket, Boom-Boom enthusiastically stabbed the patient's right foot. The patient screamed.
Wooden Leg Wilcox, within the limits of his ability to do it, jumped up and down indignantly and yelled, "What the . Why you crazy ."
Turning to a nurse, he ordered, "Get Goofus. Get him down here."
Summoned by the Chairman of the Board, Goofus appeared immediately. "Why you got this crazy bastard working in here?" demanded the Chairman.
"Well, gee," said Goofus, "everybody's supposed "
"Look, you jerk," interrupted Wooden Leg, "if I ever hear this crazy bastard is workin' in heah, you're gonna be used up."
"Well, okay. Sure, Leg," said Goofus.
"Hey, Doc," said the patient to Boom-Boom. "I feel better already. How about hittin' me one more time?"
Boom-Boom, with all his strength, drove the ice pick into the lower part of the patient's artificial limb.
"How's that?" he asked.
"Oh, Doc," sighed the patient, "finest kind. I think I'm gonna live."
DRAGONS
ONE NEVER knows what'll happen on Monday mornings at Spruce Harbor Medical Center. I was in the coffee shop, seated with Goofus MacDuff, my Medical Director, and Dr. Ferenc Ovari. At a nearby table were Duke Forrest, Spearchucker Jones, Boom-Boom Benner, Trapper John McIntyre and Hawkeye Pierce.
There was a lull in their conversation. I sensed that something was about to happen and just hoped it wouldn't be too bad. Spearchucker Jones arose, walked purposefully toward our table and, addressing Goofus MacDuff, said, "Hey, Health King, you wanna fight?"
For some time now Goofus has been on many committees planning the largesse of health which the government is laying upon us. He has even learned to say "at this point in time," "ongoing" and "study in depth." This is the basic lexicon of health planners. Goofus uses these magic expressions so often that Health King is truly an apt name.
"Why should I want to fight?" asked Goofus in; quavering voice, sort of scrunching over to hide behind the bulk of Rex Eatapuss.
"Because I heard w
hat you said."
"What did I say?"
"You said 'hopefully,' 'study in depth' and 'at this point in time' all in one sentence. We can't have that kind of talk. You hear me, boy?"
"Y-yes, sir."
"Okay, I'll overlook it this time, but be damn careful, Health King."
Spearchucker had no more than returned to his table when Hawkeye Pierce got up, came over, sat down in Dr. Ovari's ample lap and told the surprised psychologist, "Rex Eatapuss, I love you."
"What I been tellin' you?" I heard Spearchucke say. "That honkey's softer than a sneakerful of grits."
Rex Eatapuss sort of squealed. "Listen to hi squeal," Hawkeye exhorted his following. "He loves me, too." Hawk pinched Rex's plump cheek and got; up, saying, "I'll see you later, sweetie."
"You are a psychopath. You are a deviate," proclaimed Rex Eatapuss.
After a few moments of silence while no one seemed to have much to say, the conversation at the surgeons' table turned to Duke Forrest's weekend. Actually he and his wife had spent two days at the Park Entrance Motel in Bar Harbor and played golf at Kebo Valley. Duke chose, however, to tell a different story, which was:
On the previous Wednesday he and Mrs. Penelope Flewelling, a witch friend of Hawkeye's, had flown to Ulan Bator, Outer Mongolia. The flight time on Penelope's new broomstick had been just under twenty minutes. Reason for trip: As club champion of Wawenock Harbor Country Club, Duke had been invited to play in the Outer Mongolian Open, which he won with a score of 72. Seventy-two consecutive holes in one.
"A record that should hold up," said Boom-Boom Benner.
Rex Eatapuss and Goofus (Health King) MacDuff left the coffee shop after hearing of this feat. They seemed disturbed by this and other events of the morning.
That very afternoon two men appeared in the surgical waiting room of the Finest Kind Clinic and demanded to see Doctors Pierce and Forrest immediately. A secretary politely asked them to wait, but they avowed that they would not wait because they were authorized to take Dr. Pierce and Dr. Forrest to the State Hospital in Augusta where they had been committed for psychiatric examination.
The secretary just laughed, but as the two sheriffs deputies advanced upon the doctors' inner office, she stopped laughing and ran to get Hawkeye and Spearchucker. When help arrived the deputies were standing in front of Duke's desk, and Duke was explaining that he was a dangerous maniac and their best bet was to cut out quickly before he took punitive action.
"What's the problem, George?" Hawk asked one of l he deputies, with whom he'd grown up.
"We gotta take you and him, Hawk. Dr. MacDuff and Dr. Ovari signed papers on you."
"You better get out of here, George, because if you don't you're likely to get hurt. Does that give you any kind of message?"
"Unless," added Spearchucker, "you have butterfly nets. Naturally, if you got butterfly nets we wouldn't dream of interfering."
The deputies were silent. "Maybe we could save time and examine them for butterfly nets," suggested Hawkeye.
"Indeed, we could do that," said Spearchucker, wh seemed attracted by the idea.
The idea didn't seem to attract the deputies. "You ain't heard the last of this, Hawkeye," said George.
"Now," said Spearchucker to Duke, "will you please explain what this is all about?"
"I haven't the faintest idea. If Goofus and Rex Eatapuss think I'm crazy, y'all ask them. I got patients waiting."
Later that afternoon Hawkeye barged into the office of Dr. Goofus MacDuff and said, "Goofus, sit and talk to me. We need to discuss this and that."
"Gee," said Goofus, "that sounds like a good idea."
"You better believe it is. What's this crap about having Duke and me committed?"
"Well, gee, I don't know why you're upset. We didn't have any choice. Everybody knows about you and you must have heard about Duke Forrest."
"Heard what?"
"Dr. Forrest spent half an hour in the hospital coffee shop this morning telling everybody he'd spent four days in Outer Mongolia—some place called Oven Butter."
"You mean Ulan Bator," Hawk prompted him. "That's the capital of Outer Mongolia."
"Yes, of course. Duke says he won the Ulan Bator Open. Says he shot seventy-two consecutive holes in one."
"Amazing," agreed Hawkeye. "All-time record. But I don't seem to understand why you are so upset. Why not rejoice that a member of our staff has achieved such distinction?"
Unruffled, Goofus patiently explained how Duke claimed that he'd flown to Outer Mongolia in nineteen minutes on a broomstick driven by a witch named Pamela Fleming.
"You seem to have trouble with proper names, Ooofus," said Hawkeye. "Not Pamela Fleming. The Witch's name is Mrs. Penelope Flewelling. I've known the broad all my life. She lives in a cave beneath a tree with a hollow trunk on the edge of the saltmarsh in Crabapple Cove."
"Gee," said Goofus, "you really are crazy. I've wondered."
"Wondered what, Goofus?"
"If you're crazy."
"Goofus, I just don't understand you," said Hawkeye. "Apparently you've blown the whole deal. The fact is, Penelope took Duke over on her new stick, which has eight forward gears. She's been breaking it in. If she opened that thing up, she figures she could make Ulan Bator in maybe fourteen minutes. I hope we have everything straightened out, Goofus. See you."
Hawkeye drove home, laughing most of the way. As his children grew, he'd gone the good daddy route and read children's books at bedtime. As time passed, he'd had Dr. Seuss, particularly, and most children's literature right up to his ears. He had, therefore, created his own stories, which were completely ridiculous, but telling them stimulated him more than "Ant and Bee." His stories seemed to stimulate his children, too. Duke, he knew, had heard Penelope Flewelling stories from Willy and Steve Pierce. Duke, obviously, in a quixotic moment, had stolen one for use in the coffee shop. The story of seventy-two holes in one at the Ulan Bator Open, a Hawkeye original, was a favorite of Dr. Pierce's golf-oriented children.
"I can't believe it, though," Hawk said to himself. "I can't believe that anyone could take anything so silly seriously. On the other hand, I'm beginning to understand. People around here have little exposure and little imagination. A surgeon, like Duke, is viewed with a sort of awe. Duke thought he was just amusing the folks and it never occurred to him that anyone would not be amused. He overrates the troops, and guess he's too good an actor. It'd be a pity not to take advantage of this and get a few laughs."
That evening Hawkeye was reading a collection of papers about chronic pancreatitis when the phone rang. Jim Holden, his lawyer, the most sure-foot young mouthpiece in Maine, said, "What the hell you and Duke up to?"
"You mean what?"
"The Judge called. Goofus and Rex Eatapuss are trying to place you and Duke in the peculiar parlor."
"That should be fun."
"Look, Hawkeye. I know you think it's funny and so does the Judge, but he can't ignore it. He's going out of his way to straighten things out, mostly because you've been grabbing him on the golf course and he can't get even if you're in the fool farm. He wants an informal hearing with you, me, Duke, Goofus and Rex. He says he has to have two psychiatrists from the fool farm present and he says if you and Duke keep up this nonsense he'll stick you both away for fifty: years. We're all going to meet the Judge in his office at ten o'clock on Wednesday. Be there and don't screw up, or I'll give you to him."
Judge Jim Carr looked forward to Wednesday because he, unlike grunts like Goofus and Rex Eatapuss, knew the whole thing was a joke. He hoped Hawkeye and Duke wouldn't overdo it, but secretly he hoped they'd provide an interesting morning.
In the Judge's chambers Goofus told Judge Carr of Duke's alleged participation in a golf tournament in Ulan Bator, and of the nineteen-minute ride on Mrs. Flewelling's broomstick.
"Dr. Forrest," asked Judge Carr when Goofus was through, "would you care to comment?"
"Judge, you ever played Ulan Bator?" asked Duke.
"No," the judge admitted. "But let's get to the point, Dr. Forrest. You have stated that you shot seventy- two consecutive holes in one. This defies belief. Your sanity, as a result, has been questioned."
"Mrs. Flewelling just kind of kept guiding them balls," explained Duke. "She can make herself invisible, you now. Why, she'd just glide in on that new broom, pick up my drive in midair and deliver it to the cup."
"Dr. Forrest, this is an informal hearing. You are not under oath, but it could come to that. Are you prepared to repeat this story in a court?"
"Of course," agreed Duke.
"Very well," the judge said. "Dr. Pierce, may I ask you a few questions?"
MASH Mania Page 5