“But you never saw him,” Con turned and eyed Danny evenly. “You never met him.”
“Never,” Danny replied. “I’ll tell you the whole story sometime,” Danny’s voice trailed off. He turned looking around the room. “Not many of the old faces,” he said as if speaking to himself.
Con saw the girls coming across the room, Margaret leading Sue with vivacious even strides. She stopped and said something and introduced Sue to the only other Americans in the room; a group of medical officers hosted apparently by a group of native civilians or refugees.
Con bit down hard, his fist clenched hurtingly. He felt a sudden sour hateful anguished futility remembering his Kachins and how often he had asked base to get him a medical officer. Always, always the same answer. And every week his own little brown men died because his clumsy untrained fingers had to sew them up while these medical bastards sat idly around on their asses nursing champagne.
It wasn’t fair. No, it wasn’t fair, goddamn it, he thought blindly. And as his eyes focused again, for a moment he felt ragged, tired and drained. Just like he had felt fleetingly when the small plane touched its wheels to the Ledo earth this morning. This morning. Was it possible that it was only this morning? He raised his hand, mopping his coldly wet forehead and turned to wait as Margaret moved toward him.
The girls finished their drink and they all took a booth. Danny ordered strips of Indian Ocean pompano, vichyssoise, Chef’s own green salad, potatoes champ, dandelion greens in olive oil and vinegar chilled; and for dessert a gooseberry tansey. Then from the wine steward he ordered two bottles of iced dry white wine, resin flavored, imported from the Cyprus Islands.
The wine was served immediately and they toasted a happy evening.
“Oh, but this wine is good,” Sue said pertly. “I won’t mind drinking this, it’s so light and easy to take.”
“You watch that wine, young lady,” Danny said. “It’s rather sneaky.”
Con was holding Margaret’s hand watching Sue tasting the wine as if she were a connoisseur.
“Dance with me, Danny,” Sue said abruptly, bluntly.
“I say, I should have asked you before,” Danny replied. “It wasn’t very polite of me.” The orchestra was playing Three O’clock In The Morning and they got up to dance.
“I guess I’ve been rather odd today, Margaret,” Con said turning to her in the booth.
“I guess we were both shocked a little,” she spoke assuredly now, as if it were natural that they should feel this way under the circumstances.
She had rouged her cheeks so lightly that it was barely noticeable. It didn’t detract from her at all, he saw, but she had never rouged before. She had a talent for dressing and making up to the very limit, but never would she lose the basic simplicity of a smart woman.
“I had the strangest experience on the way over,” she said seriously, her chin high. “While our ship was waiting to come through the locks at Suez.”
“I didn’t realize you came through the Mediterranean,” he said. “Did you have any trouble?”
“We lost one ship,” she pressured his hand and lowered her eyes. “Let’s not talk about it, Con. It was horrible.”
“I’m sorry, Margaret.” He handed her his wine glass and she drank, then nervously she took a cigarette and he held her light.
“You remember that terrible experience I had teaching at Wisconsin,” her vivacious dark eyes moved restlessly. “Well, I saw the boy,” she said sullenly. “I swear I saw him on a troop ship going past our ship into the locks of Suez,” she said a little loudly, a little off key.
So we are started on him again, Con thought. He should have expected that. This goddamn thing was turning out to be a game of tactics. Just like war in the hills he thought, irritated. Irritated, yes, but no longer greenly sour suspicious over just hearing him mentioned. What a wet-eyed lament that old story has been. Howcome I never get no sympathy, he almost laughed out loud. Poor boy. Poor Con. No sympathy. He finished off his glass of wine, then poured another, feeling a little hysterical.
“I saw him standing at the rail with hundreds of other soldiers and I couldn’t reach him,” she tapped her thumb on the end of her cigarette frustratingly.
“Oh, Con,” she looked up at him sadly, “if I don’t square myself with him I don’t think I’ll ever be happy. Not completely, ever.”
He had both hands on the stem of his glass staring into the light of the clear twangy wine, his lower lip protruding meditatively, and he felt her hand touch his arm.
“It will all work out, Margaret. We have to suffer for our old mistakes. Yet often those things happen for the best,” he said still looking at the wineglass, feeling for the first time since he had known her some compassion, even pity.
He was aware of her sliding over closer to him. He looked out on the dance floor and saw Danny and Sue dancing expertly, then the short sloppy fat man danced by lightly, sweating, chatting with the beautiful halfcaste who was taller than he. Then through the maze of dancers across the room Con saw the huge square back of Colonel Pearson seated on a chair facing a group of people in the large corner booth.
“The Colonel’s here,” Con said enthusiastically.
She had been watching Con, feeling again that he was a great distance away, feeling that maybe she had been left in the twilight.
He walked to the corner of the dance floor pausing to tell Danny and Sue that he was going after the Colonel, then moved on lightly, quick and alert as if he walked still in the forests of the hills.
“Good evening, Raymond,” Con put his hand on the Colonel’s shoulder.
The Colonel turned the battered, ruddy face up slowly, grinning.
“Remind me if I ever keep you waiting to remind you of today,” Con said merrily. “What the hell; you’re just four hours late,” Con put both hands up. “I know. A conference.”
“It couldn’t be helped, Con,” the Colonel stood up. “And I’ll go along with you. If the army limited their conferences to one hour we’d save enough man-hours to be able to fight another war plus these two.” The orchestra had stopped playing and the loudspeaker began to drift music immediately; gypsy music again.
“This is one of my boys,” the Colonel put his arm around Con affectionately. There were only three at the table; an elderly distinguished white moustached man named Turner and his middle aged wife. He was, the Colonel said, the representative for G.M. in the Far East, run out of Singapore. And a lovely, madonna like woman, blonde and gracious, wearing a white finely woven Kashmir gown of simple Grecian design. Her hair was pulled tight, parted in the middle and bunned in back and she wore a small diamond tiara set forward on her head.
The Colonel introduced her as Miss Carlotta Vesari, a refugee and acquaintance. Gracefully she extended her hand to Con: “Please call me Carla, Captain,” she said coolly, imperially. And just as they were about to sit down the short sloppy fat man and the halfcaste returned from the dance floor, and Con was introduced to Gus Regas, the shipping magnate, and Nickie Kukir.
“Have you come from the war, Captain?” Carla asked. Her nose was straight and almost perfect, and one tanned shoulder was exposed, classically rounded, the other covered with the white Grecian style sash that wrapped around her.
“This morning,” Con said and looked at the halfcaste. “It seems rather strange, too, that it was only this morning.” For one quick moment Nickie reminded him of Niven’s Shan girl, but she was much more beautiful than that.
He could hardly keep his eyes off her. He doubted if the beautiful halfcaste Lau’rel often spoke of could be as enchanting as this.
“You came from Burma?” Nickie asked excitedly, warmly.
“From Burma,” Con spoke reluctantly, as if he no longer wished to discuss the war.
“Where?” Nickie asked, her hands folded under her chin, her eyes dark wide.
“Ah, finally I meet a fighting man,” Gus interjected. “I say, I should have known that it would be a Greek.”
“He really can’t say where he’s come from,” the alert Colonel interrupted. “I’ve really tied him up so that he can hardly speak about anything,” the Colonel half-smiled at Con, realizing he was on the hook and trying to get him off as smoothly as possible.
“Ray,” Con turned to the Colonel. “I’ll have to get back to the table soon. You’re going to join us?”
“In a moment, Con. I want to settle one more thing with Mr. Turner. Wait for me.”
“Go to it, I’ll wait,” Con put his hand on the Colonel’s bull neck and turned it slightly toward the man from G.M. “The Colonel is going to talk business to you, Mr. Turner. May I warn you not to let his appearance fool you,” Con grinned.
“Ah, the young Greek’s got his number,” the Greek Regas said. “Kheee, Kheee, he’s got his number. I say, that’s good.” The musty odor of his Turkish cigarette permeated the air.
“You talk to your Colonel like that?” Carlotta, the Madonna face, asked as if she didn’t believe what she had just seen and heard.
Con turned at her quickly, squinting, as if he had been in the hills and was suddenly taken unaware from behind. “And what is wrong with the way I talk to my Colonel,” he said. He was suddenly glaring. The Greek and Nickie and the wife of the man from G.M. sat rigid, transfixed.
“It’s just.…”
He interrupted: “It’s just that you never heard anyone talk to a Colonel like that.”
“Never,” she said strikingly.
“And where are you from?” Con asked a little sarcastically.
“Vienna,” she answered coldly. “But I’m Hungarian,” she lifted her head proudly, majestically.
“No wonder,” he said penetratingly. And she not only looks like a Greek statue, he thought, she acts like one. People hardly ever looked like what they were, but she did.
“He has such a nice temper, Gus,” Nickie said impetuously, innocently. “A fine temper for an American.”
“Kheeee, Kheee,” the Greek wheezed mopping his sweating brow. “I won’t apologize for Nickie, Captain. It would be useless, really it would,” the Greek said in his exaggerated English accent. “She always says just what she pleases, y’know.”
Suddenly Con grinned at Nickie, then glanced at the Colonel impatiently as if to say: Come on, let’s get moving. Carla was watching him as he stroked his goatee, squaring his shoulders as if he were some animal awakening from a deep sleep. Abruptly he turned to her.
“I apologize,” he said softly. “I’m afraid I’ve been rather rude. Don’t judge all Americans by me.” He pointed to his empty glass: “I’m afraid I’ve had a little too much wine this evening,” he smiled apologetically. And yet she knew he was not apologizing for what he had drunk.
“Nickie, dear, I say, write down my address for the Captain,” the Greek said. “I would like him to come and visit us.” He turned to Con. “Any time you’re in town,” he smiled his depraved smile.
He looks something like a combination of Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre, Con thought. But this guy was no actor.
Con and the Colonel were standing now saying their good-byes all around.
“I appreciate what you’re doing for the boys,” the Colonel said to the man from G.M. “I hope it will work out. It was a damn fine suggestion,” he added conclusively. They started across the room for their table, and Con saw the waiters already busy setting the extra place.
“You don’t talk like a Colonel,” Sue giggled. “Not like the ones I know. You talk like a sergeant I was out with once,” she said, a little tight.
“Sue,” Margaret scolded. “You’re as bad as Con.”
“I’m flattered,” the Colonel grinned. “I was quite sure while being a Colonel I’d been called everything. But never a sergeant.”
“I like you, Colonel. You’re regular,” Sue said innocently, smiling and wrinkling her nose.
They all laughed at the deliberate bluntness of her statement.
“Marvelous, marvelous,” Danny said looking at her admiringly.
They served the first course, the strips of pompano, and Danny ordered two more bottles of wine. They ate and drank leisurely, chatting, and then the Colonel asked Sue to dance and Danny excused himself. Con and Margaret finished their wine and he moved closer to her.
“Dance once with me, Con,” she said suddenly. “Hold me close.”
“Yes,” he smiled. I’d like to dance.”
They danced until the set was over, then they all regrouped at the table. When the music began again Margaret and the Colonel went to the floor.
“I’m sure you’ve done a lot for Con today, Margaret,” the Colonel said holding her away and looking down at her. “The boy has done a hell of a job and he’s had a rough go.”
“Is he in danger?” she asked.
“Didn’t he tell you anything?”
“No,” she said.
“Did you ask him?”
“No, I thought I’d better not,” she paused. “I was so glad just to be with him again.”
“He’s been in it pretty thick,” the Colonel said. He felt her hand tighten on his. “I can’t tell you what he’s been doing, but he may end up a rather important guy.”
“I always knew that,” she said confidently. “He’s been in the fighting, then.”
“He and Danny have been doing most all of it themselves.”
“Doesn’t he deserve a rest.”
“He deserves it.” She must be a very good dancer the Colonel thought, being able to make me dance without concentrating on it. “It all depends on this conference we’re having tomorrow.”
“Then he must go tomorrow,” she said depressedly, lowering her eyes.
“He must.”
“And he can’t write at all?” she asked.
“Maybe later on.”
“I don’t know you very well, Colonel,” she looked up at him weakly. “But do you suppose from time to time you might let me know how he is. Drop me a line, or if you’re in town ring me up.”
“I’d be glad to,” he said understandingly.
She smiled appreciatively for a moment, then the smile vanished and in its place was the mask of a lostness and despondency: “At times, today, he scared me, he’s changed so.”
“I know. I almost felt that way about him myself,” he said staring vacantly over her head. The tempo changed as the orchestra slid into another, slower number. “A man like that will always change. If he didn’t change, didn’t satisfy his great curiosity it would kill him. He’d die of boredom,” he paused. “War itself is a great changer. And it isn’t all bad.”
“I’m afraid I’ve been very selfish with him,” she said sullenly.
“We all have that fear at times, Margaret,” the massive man said.
“I do so want him to be happy,” she rested her head on the Colonel’s shoulder briefly, gently, then they finished their dance and returned to the table.
Standing on the curb in front of the club, Con waved off several cabs and hailed a horse drawn open hansom. Margaret gave her address and they started out trotting down the street the rhythmic clop of the hooves audibly clear as they banged the pavement. Sometime during their dinner there had been a rain, and now the sky was cloudy but the air was rain fresh and clean. He sat in the corner and she rested inside his arm her head on his chest as he sat almost sideways on the seat.
“Why didn’t you tell me you’ve been fighting?” she almost whispered, feeling his hand in her hair.
“Why didn’t you ask me?” he said. “Anyhow, I thought you assumed it.” They were going down a boulevard and trees lined the sides and the branches hung over the road and he could smell the wet leaves.
He was really so indifferent, she thought. All day long he had been showing her two different sides of himself and she didn’t know either one,
and one side didn’t seem to have any positive relation to the other. For a moment she felt humiliated and weak, bewildered; not knowing whether to throw herself at him wholly, or to be remote and try to bring him to her. Then she wasn’t even sure they were that far apart. She put an arm around his chest pulling him closer, feeling her fingers against his ribs.
This was not the real Con, yet how could she expect him to be? It was the war that had affected him. Men had strange reactions to fighting; even the Colonel had implied it. While they were dancing he had implied it purposely and because of Con. War was a changer, he had said. Of course, and Con needed her more now than ever, she thought with her eyes half closed, her head buried deeper into his chest, smelling the man smell, moving closer still.
Down the empty streets they drove to the even gait of the horse’s hooves, feeling the wine and brandy and the air that was fresh and their close bodies, then they arrived at the apartment.
She turned on the phonograph and her bearer brought drinks while she slipped into a silken lounging robe.
They finished their drink and she called for another.
“I thought you didn’t feel like drinking,” he said. They were sitting on the couch.
“I want to do what you want to do,” she said. “I want to drink with you. To have fun like we used to, Con.” God but she had charm when she wanted to have it, he thought.
They had several more drinks and talked about Washington and their other days. She lit the candle lamps, and he turned out the lights. A cool breeze came fast through the large grilled latticed iron where the French doors were, then they saw long tropical streaks of lightning and it began to thunder, then down came the rain and suddenly, hungrily as if he were a part enveloped of the storm he took her on the couch.
They walked from the living room towards the bedroom and it was cold marble then oriental rugs against his bare feet, then cold marble and oriental rugs, then clean, clean sheets, silk sheets, and a soft feather mattress bed.
A lamp glowed in the corner of the room and she left and came back with a tray and a brandy bottle. They had more drinks, and she gave him new love that night, a different love than ever before.
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