W E B Griffin - BoW 03 - The Majors

by The Majors(Lit)

  Felter was pleased when Lowell could not complete his call

  Captain Philip Sheridan Parker IV, and was limited to a urief, maudlin conversation with Dr. Antoinette Parker.

  Antoinette assured him that she would have Phil check to what, if anything, Warrant Officer Candidate Franklin dud, and then asked to speak to Sharon.

  Lowell moved to an armchair in the living room while the stalked, and fell asleep. That solved another problem,

  per decided. Lowell was obviously too drunk to drive back k Washington. Virginia police were death on drunken driving

  The chair was reclining. Felter got Lowell into a nearly watal position, loosened his necktie and belt, removed his

  L and draped a blanket over him. was still talking to Antoinette when he finished.

  He waved at her, and went upstairs and got in bed.

  He heard her come into the room ten minutes later, listened sound of her undressing, felt the bed sag as she got in him.

  Tou awake?" Sharon asked.

  am now," Sandy replied.

  "Antoinette wants us to come down there for New Year's

  Eve," Sharon said.

  Felter didn't reply.

  "I want to go, Sandy," Sharon said.

  "It's a thousand miles down there," Sandy said. "You real want to go a thousand miles to sit around an officer's club it of drunks in dress uniforms?"

  "Yes," she said.

  "What did you say?"

  "I want to go," Sharon repeated. "I want to walk into officer's club with you, in uniform. I want to wear my W

  Point ring, and I want you to wear your West Point ring, an

  I want you to wear your uniform with all your ribbons and al your medals. I'm just a little sick of pretending the man married to is an economic analyst for the god damned CIA."

  She's really drunk, Sanford Felter realized. Sharon rare swore.

  The confirmation of that analysis came when he rolled over and put his arms around her and found that she was naked.

  "Surprise, surprise," she said.

  "Not that I mind, of course, but what brought this on?'

  Felter asked.

  "I got very horny, Sandy," Sharon said, solemnly, "whei

  Colonel Whatsisname was here."

  "Let me have that again?" he asked, amused. Her had moved to his groin. "Women are turned on by strong powerful men," Sharon said. She giggled as he started to grov erect. "Wheee!" she said.

  He put his hand to her breast. It was firm and the nip erect.

  "You were the strongest man in the room," she

  "Stronger, Sandy, than that colonel. Stronger than Craig."

  He was, he realized, deeply flattered. Even if she was drunk

  In vino veritas, he thought.

  "But I never get a chance to show you off," she said. want to show you off, Sandy. I never get a chance to be officer's lady. That's important to a woman. You're a man ai you don't understand that."

  "If you really want to go to Rucker, we'll go to Rucker," said. He was a little ashamed of himself. Going to Rucker a preposterous idea. What he wanted to do was screw. A prick, he told himself, has no conscience.

  Sharon was a good solid woman. This was the third time

  2 they had been married that he knew for sure she was ok. She had gotten drunk after they buried Craig's wife, she had gotten drunk when her father died. When he thought that, there was something unnerving about her being

  now. Was her nerves' that serious a problem? put that thought from his mind. There was something

  4 about her being drunk now and wanting him to screw lie liked it. In the morning, she would be a little embarassed about taking too much to drink, about what she was now. She would realize then that going to Rucker was

  absurd. ane twisted away from him.

  "What are you doing?" Sandy asked.

  The bedside lamp came on.

  I want to see," Sharon said. "I want to watch!"

  "You little vixen, you!" he said, and knelt between her legs. could feel his excitement in his chest. He thought that it be four days before the kids came back from Newark. iught he would bring a bottle home some afternoon. me, Sandy!" Sharon hissed in his ear. "Fuck me

  :did.

  Sanford Felter went downstairs in the morning, Sharon aking Craig eat scrambled eggs, despite his protests that wanted was a cup of coffee. she avoided her husband's eyes when he sat down at the table. She scrambled some more eggs and put them before him, toast and grape jelly and grapefruit juice. Then she sat at the table, and stirred her coffee.

  Craig," she said, "if Sandy can get off, will you take us to Fort Rucker for New Year's Eve? Antoinette asked us." well, surprised, Craig hesitated before replying. Sandy knew he tig didn't want to spend New Year's Eve at the Rucker

  officer's open mess any more than he did.

  "Madame," Lowell said, "Lowell Airlines is at your beck and call."

  Sharon looked at Sandy, met his eyes.

  "The kids can stay with Mama Felter," Sharon said.

  Alabama

  November 1958

  QUESTION: What is a WOC?

  ANSWER: Sir, a WOC is something one fwows at a wabbit.

  It had been rumored among both the staff of Warrant Officer kdidate Battalion, the U.S. Army Aviation School, and among

  WOCs themselves that an amnesty would be granted by commanding general to mark the Thanksgiving holiday.

  General Paul T. Jiggs, the post commander, who had otherwise earned a reputation as a starchy bastard, seemed to derive some kind of a perverse pleasure in freeing WOCs from restrictions imposed by the WOC staff on whatever slim excuse he could find. Thanksgiving, to both the restricted and the restrictors, seemed to be just the sort of excuse the general would be pleased to have available.

  Of the 254 WOCs in Companies A through D, thirty-two

  WOCs were under restriction of varying degree. Those WOCs whose academic grades were below acceptable standards, and who were guilty of no other offense against the rules and regulations, were restricted to the WOC area, but permitted to sign themselves out at the orderly room and visit the post exchange and the post theater. This authority specifically excluded visiting the post exchange cafeteria.

  WOCs guilty of other violations were under progressively more restrictive restraints, in proportion to their offenses against the regulations. The most severe restriction imposed (beyond which punishment was expulsion from the WOC program) required that the WOCs, between the 0600 and 2200 hours, confine themselves to their rooms. During this period, dressed in a Class "A" uniform, they had the option of standing or sitting at their study desk. They were not permitted to smoke.

  Aside from a thirty-minute period during which they were permitted to read the daily newspaper, their reading material was limited to official textbooks and army manuals. The operation of radios, televisions, or other electronic amusement devices was proscribed.

  The most common violation with which the WOCs on restriction were charged was "conduct unbecoming a warrant officer candidate and a gentleman." The specific charge was most often "use of vulgar and/or obscene and/or blasphemous language."

  Ninety percent of the WOC class of which WOC William

  B. Franklin was a member consisted of regular army noncommissioned officers between the ages of twenty years and six months and twenty-six years and six months, and in the grades of E-5 through E-7, that is to say staff sergeants, sergeants first class, and master sergeants, or their technical counterparts, specialists five, six, and seven. There were tank commanders and cartographers, first sergeants and budget analysts, infantry platoon sergeants and medical corps x-ray technicians. There were aircraft mechanics and avionic technicians, photographers, small arms artificers, and even one farrier, who had come to flight school from Fort Meyers, Virginia, where he had been in charge of the horses used in the military funerals held half a dozen times a day at Arlington National Cemetery.

  What they had in common, in addition to genera
lly splendid physical condition, an average of 6.7 years of enlisted service, and Army General Classification Test (AGCT) scores averaging

  123.6 (an AGCT score of 110 is required of officer candidates), was the desire to become both helicopter pilots and warrant officers.

  They were old soldiers; they had been around. They knew that the pay scale for warrant officers was precisely that of officers in the ranks of second lieutenant through major. They would put up with whatever bullshit the army threw at them for six months, or however long it took, and they'd come out of it with a warrant, and it would be sayonara and auf Wiedersehen to the bullshit that went with being a god damned EM.

  If they liked the life of an officer, they could wangle a commission and go for thirty, and if it turned out to be a pain in the ass, they'd just put in their twenty (drawing flight pay meanwhile) and retire at fifty percent of their base pay.

  Getting through the bullshit was going to pose no problem at all. They weren't a bunch of fucking recruits, for Christ's sake. They knew the army game, and they knew how to play it. Cover your ass, keep your shoes shined, your pants pressed, your hair cut, and your mouth shut.

  The army, for Christ's sake, was not going to fuck around with a bunch of old soldiers.

  The orders which assigned them to the U.S. Army Aviation

  Center, Fort Rucker, Alabama, specifically forbade travel by private automobile and clearly stated that since the warrant officer candidates would be restricted to the barracks for the first six weeks of their training, "dependents are discouraged from accompanying sponsors."

  Well, bullshit! Let the Old Lady drive the car, get a motel or a room someplace, and then it would simply be a matter of going over the fence at night to share the nuptial couch.

  The orders which had sent them to Fort Rucker four months before further stated, specifically, that incoming students would report not earlier than 2000 hours and not later than 2200 hours, in Class "A" uniform, and that civilian clothing and other personal equipment would be turned in for storage to the quartermaster before they left their camp, post, or station to report the Fort.

  Sergeant Franklin had found a garage in Daleville, outside the gate, where he could leave his car and his civvies. He had taken a cab to the post, and had more or less expected to see what happened: starting at 2005 hours, a line of civilian automobiles owned by married noncoms appeared at the WOC area. Senior enlisted men, carrying for the first time in a long time a standard GI duffel bag, got out of the cars, perfunctorily kissed their wives, and marched up the sidewalk to the orderly room.

  There they were greeted by cadre, corporals, and buck sergeants.

  They knew the routine. There was a roster. Their names were checked off. They signed in. They were given room assignments and informed that they were restricted to the company area.

  They, like Franklin, were pleased with what they initially found. For one thing, they had BOQs. Regular god damned officer's BOQs, a sitting room study with a desk and even a desk lamp. A bedroom with a real bed, not even a 01 bed, a real bed, with a real mattress. There was a shower and a crapper, shared with the guy next door. It wasn't quite the accommodations

  Sergeant Franklin had had in the Hotel d'Angleterre in Algiers, but it was far more spacious and comfortable than he expected.

  The guys next door were a surprise. Goddamned buck ass private recruits, fresh from Dix or flragg or another basic training post, still showing the signs of the thirty-second haircut they'd got on their first day in the army. Bright kids, starryeyed and bushy-tailed, but god damned rookies. What the fuck they were doing here was something that would have to be figured out.

  At 0600 the next morning, a somewhat scratchy phonograph recording of reveille was played over the public address system.

  This was almost immediately followed by the announcement, repeated twice, that the uniform of the day was Class "A" with ribbons and qualification badges. Breakfast would be served at the WOC mess. WOCs would form at 0625 hours in front of the barracks. They were told to determine among themselves who was the senior noncommissioned officer, and he would form the company. A member of the cadre would serve as guide for the march to the WOC mess.

  Five master sergeants ambled outside at 0620. They were wearing immaculate uniforms and all their ribbons. They crisply saluted a five-foot-three-inch second lieutenant who was standing outside, and cheerfully barked, "Good morning, sir!" to him.

  He returned their salute, gave them a half-smile, and stood watching with his arms folded.

  They compared dates of rank, and it was determined that

  First Sergeant Kenneth 0. Spencer, until three days before top kick of Dog Company, 508th Parachute Infantry, 82nd Airborne

  Division, was the ranking noncommissioned officer.

  "What we'll do is have each of you take a platoon," First

  Sergeant Spencer said. "And you," he added to the fourth master sergeant, "will be the guide."

  While it had been some time since some of the master sergeants had marched anywhere, they knew what the hell they were doing. When the rest of the incoming class came out before the barracks, they quickly formed them into three platoons, each headed by a master sergeant. The second john (who looked as if he had gotten out of the Point last week) gestured to the cadre corporal to present the roster to First Sergeant

  Spencer.

  Roll was called.

  First Sergeant Spencer performed an impeccable about-face, snapped his right hand to his right eyebrow in an impeccable demonstration of the hand salute, and barked: "Sir, all present and accounted for."

  The shavetail returned the salute.

  "Very good. March the men to the mess, Sergeant."

  "Yes, sir!" First Sergeant Spencer said. He did another impeccable about-face.

  The mess was a pleasant surprise too. Most school mess halls were pretty god damned bad. This wasn't. There were four-man tables, each with pitchers of milk, condiments, table clothes, even napkins and flowers. More like an officer's mess than an EM mess hall. And the chow wasn't at all bad. Eggs any way you liked them, biscuits. First class.

  Nobody had said anything about marching back to the company area, but First Sergeant Spencer had apparently decided it wouldn't hurt to play it safe and do things by the book, for when Franklin came out of the mess hail, Spencer was already there to form the troops again. When they were all assembled, he marched them back to the company area. Shiny Balls the

  Second iphn was waiting there for them. First Sergeant Spencer had guessed right. He had been expected to march the men back from the mess.

  He formed the company into platoons, did an about-face, and saluted.

  "Sir, the company is formed," he barked.

  "Prepare the company for inspection in ranks, Sergeant,"

  Shiny Balls the Second John said.

  First Sergeant Spencer saluted, about-faced, stood at rigid attention and barked:

  "Open ranks, MARCH!"

  The first rank took two large steps forward; the second rank took one large step forward. The third rank did not move.

  "Dress right, dress. Ready. front!"

  First Sergeant Spencer followed Shiny Balls the Second

  John up and down the ranks. Shiny Balls stopped in front of each man, examined him from tip of cap to tip of shoes. Shiny

  Balls, thought Staff Sergeant William B. Franklin, really ate that inspecting-officer shit up.

  Finally, it was over.

  Shiny Balls stood in front of the company.

  He reached inside his tunic and took from it something that

  First Sergeant Spencer had never seen before. It was Shiny

  Balls's collection of ribbons and qualification badges. Shiny

  Balls, Sergeant Franklin saw, wasn't quite the fresh-from-the

  Point shitass he had appeared to be. Shiny Balls had his own collection of qualification badges. There was a CIB, and below the CIB a set of aviator's wings, and then, below a double line of four-abreast
ribbons, a set of jump wings. There was a Silver

  Star and Purple Heart with a cluster among the ribbons. Franklin was surprised to see the patch of ribbons and insignia on

  Shiny Balls. The only other officer he'd ever seen with a set like that, which could be put on or taken off with such ease, was Major Craig W. Lowell; and Lowell had class.

  "Gentlemen," Shiny Balls said, "my name is Oppenheimer, and I am your tactical officer. Now, ten percent of you, those who have joined us directly from basic training, will probably accept this without question. The other ninety percent of you, the noncommissioned officers, the backbone of the army, are doubtless at this moment entertaining certain questions.