Joseph Heller - Catch-22

“But you must try not to think of that, too,” Major Danby insisted. “And you must try not to let it upset you.”

“Oh, it doesn’t really upset me. What does upset me, though, is that they think I’m a sucker. They think that they’re smart, and that the rest of us are dumb. And, you know, Danby, the thought occurs to me right now, for the first time, that maybe they’re right.”

“But you must try not to think of that too,” argued Major Danby. “You must think only of the welfare of your country and the dignity of man.”

“Yeah,” said Yossarian.

“I mean it, Yossarian. This is not World War One. You must never forget that we’re at war with aggressors who would not let either one of us live if they won.”

“I know that,” Yossarian replied tersely, with a sudden surge of scowling annoyance. “Christ, Danby, I earned that medal I got, no matter what their reasons were for giving it to me. I’ve flown seventy goddam combat missions. Don’t talk to me about fighting to save my country. I’ve been fighting all along to save my country. Now I’m going to fight a little to save myself. The country’s not in danger any more, but I am.”

“The war’s not over yet. The Germans are driving toward Antwerp.”

“The Germans will be beaten in a few months. And Japan will be beaten a few months after that. If I were to give up my life now, it wouldn’t be for my country. It would be for Cathcart and Korn. So I’m turning my bombsight in for the duration. From now on I’m thinking only of me.”

Major Danby replied indulgently with a superior smile, “But, Yossarian, suppose everyone felt that way.”

“Then I’d certainly be a damned fool to feel any other way, wouldn’t I?” Yossarian sat up straighter with a quizzical expression. “You know, I have a queer feeling that I’ve been through this exact conversation before with someone. It’s just like the chaplain’s sensation of having experienced everything twice.”

“The chaplain wants you to let them send you home,” Major Danby remarked.

“The chaplain can jump in the lake.”

“Oh, dear.” Major Danby sighed, shaking his head in regretful disappointment. “He’s afraid he might have influenced you.”

“He didn’t influence me. You know what I might do? I might stay right here in this hospital bed and vegetate. I could vegetate very comfortably right here and let other people make the decisions.”

“You must make decisions,” Major Danby disagreed. “A person can’t live like a vegetable.”

“Why not?”

A distant warm look entered Major Danby’s eyes. “It must be nice to live like a vegetable,” he conceded wistfully.

“It’s lousy,” answered Yossarian.

“No, it must be very pleasant to be free from all this doubt and pressure,” insisted Major Danby. “I think I’d like to live like a vegetable and make no important decisions.”

“What kind of vegetable, Danby?”

“A cucumber or a carrot.”

“What kind of cucumber? A good one or a bad one?”

“Oh, a good one, of course.”

“They’d cut you off in your prime and slice you up for a salad.”

Major Danby’s face fell. “A poor one, then.”

“They’d let you rot and use you for fertilizer to help the good ones grow.”

“I guess I don’t want to live like a vegetable, then,” said Major Danby with a smile of sad resignation.

“Danby, must I really let them send me home?” Yossarian inquired of him seriously.

Major Danby shrugged. “It’s a way to save yourself.”

“It’s a way to lose myself, Danby. You ought to know that.”

“You could have lots of things you want.”

“I don’t want lots of things I want,” Yossarian replied, and then beat his fist down against the mattress in an outburst of rage and frustration. “Goddammit, Danby! I’ve got friends who were killed in this war. I can’t make a deal now. Getting stabbed by that bitch was the best thing that ever happened to me.”

“Would you rather go to jail?”

“Would you let them send you home?”

“Of course I would!” Major Danby declared with conviction. “Certainly I would,” he added a few moments later, in a less positive manner. “Yes, I suppose I would let them send me home if I were in your place,” he decided uncomfortably, after lapsing into troubled contemplation. Then he threw his face sideways disgustedly in a gesture of violent distress and blurted out, “Oh, yes, of course I’d let them send me home! But I’m such a terrible coward I couldn’t really be in your place.”

“But suppose you weren’t a coward?” Yossarian demanded, studying him closely. “Suppose you did have the courage to defy somebody?”

“Then I wouldn’t let them send me home,” Major Danby vowed emphatically with vigorous joy and enthusiasm. “But I certainly wouldn’t let them court-martial me.”

“Would you fly more missions?”

“No, of course not. That would be total capitulation. And I might be killed.”

“Then you’d run away?”

Major Danby started to retort with proud spirit and came to an abrupt stop, his half-opened jaw swinging closed dumbly. He pursed his lips in a tired pout. “I guess there just wouldn’t be any hope for me, then, would there?”

His forehead and protuberant white eyeballs were soon glistening nervously again. He crossed his limp wrists in his lap and hardly seemed to be breathing as he sat with his gaze drooping toward the floor in acquiescent defeat. Dark, steep shadows slanted in from the window. Yossarian watched him solemnly, and neither of the two men stirred at the rattling noise of a speeding vehicle skidding to a stop outside and the sound of racing footsteps pounding toward the building in haste.

“Yes, there’s hope for you,” Yossarian remembered with a sluggish flow of inspiration. “Milo might help you. He’s bigger than Colonel Cathcart, and he owes me a few favors.”

Major Danby shook his head and answered tonelessly. “Milo and Colonel Cathcart are pals now. He made Colonel Cathcart a vice-president and promised him an important job after the war.”

“Then ex-P.F.C. Wintergreen will help us,” Yossarian exclaimed. “He hates them both, and this will infuriate him.”

Major Danby shook his head bleakly again. “Milo and ex-P.F.C. Wintergreen merged last week. They’re all partners now in M amp; M Enterprises.”

“Then there is no hope for us, is there?”

“No hope.”

“No hope at all, is there?”

“No, no hope at all,” Major Danby conceded. He looked up after a while with a half-formed notion. “Wouldn’t it be nice if they could disappear us the way they disappeared the others and relieve us of all these crushing burdens?”

Yossarian said no. Major Danby agreed with a melancholy nod, lowering his eyes again, and there was no hope at all for either of them until footsteps exploded in the corridor suddenly and the chaplain, shouting at the top of his voice, came bursting into the room with the electrifying news about Orr, so overcome with hilarious excitement that he was almost incoherent for a minute or two. Tears of great elation were sparkling in his eyes, and Yossarian leaped out of bed with an incredulous yelp when he finally understood.

“Sweden?” he cried.

“Orr!” cried the chaplain.

“Orr?” cried Yossarian.

“Sweden!” cried the chaplain, shaking his head up and down with gleeful rapture and prancing about uncontrollably from spot to spot in a grinning, delicious frenzy. “It’s a miracle, I tell you! A miracle! I believe in God again. I really do. Washed ashore in Sweden after so many weeks at sea! It’s a miracle.”

“Washed ashore, hell!” Yossarian declared, jumping all about also and roaring in laughing exultation at the walls, the ceiling, the chaplain and Major Danby. “He didn’t wash ashore in Sweden. He rowed there! He rowed there, Chaplain, he rowed there.”