Griffin W.E.B. - The Corps 08 - In Dangers Path

«So I can drive up here on weekends and see Janice,» Weston said.

Kister's eyes swiveled back and forth between them.

Janice blushed.

«1 think the time has come for me to fold my tent and silently steal away,» Commander Kister said.

«Oh, doctor, don't go, please,» Janice said.

«Okay,» Kister said. «The three of us can go out and have a lobster.»

He waited, with a straight face, until he saw the anguished looks on their faces. Then he chuckled, slapped Weston on the back, and walked out of the bar.

note 22

The Marquis de Lafayette Suite

The Foster Lafayette Hotel

Washington, D.C.

I900 17 February 1943

Captain Kenneth R. McCoy, USMCR, was dozing when the telephone rang. He was almost instantly awake, but for a moment didn't know where he was. A moment later he did realize where he was, and also realized that Ernie wasn't in the bed with him. As he sat up and swung his feet out of the bed, he reached for the bedside telephone. The bathroom door was open, he noticed then, and Ernie was standing in it, naked except for a towel wrapped around her waist. She had another towel in her hand. As he watched, she resumed drying her hair with it.

«I was wondering if you were going to answer that,» she said.

My God, she's beautiful!

«I must have dropped off,» he said, and picked up the telephone.

«Lieutenant McCoy,» he said.

«That's

Captain

McCoy, I think. Why don't you write that on the back of your hand?» Captain Edward Sessions, USMC, said.

«I guess I'm not used to being a captain,» McCoy said. «What's up, Ed?»

Ernie was now leaning on the door, listening to the conversation. Dressed as she was, wearing nothing but the towel around her waist, and with most of her left leg peeking out through the flap in the towel, she was incredibly erotic. Even if she didn't mean to be.

Or is she doing that because she knows damned well how it will excite me?

«I've been appointed officer-in-charge of getting you off on your presidentially directed administrative leave,» Sessions said.

«Which means what?»

«I've got your orders, new ID card, new credentials, et cetera, et cetera.»

«You've been busy.»

«And money. Another partial pay.»

«And you want me to come over there?»

«No. I'll come there if you want. But what Jeanne wants is for you and Ernie to come over here. To the apartment, I mean. For dinner.»

«What is it?» Ernie asked.

«Jeanne wants us to come for dinner,» McCoy said.

«Great! I want to see the baby. Tell him yes.»

«Unless, of course, we'd be interrupting something important,» Sessions said. «I would understand that.»

«Screw you,» McCoy said.

«Jeanne wants to show Ernie the baby,» Sessions said.

«What time?»

«How soon could you come? We could have a couple of drinks.»

«How soon could you be ready?» McCoy asked Ernie.

«Just as soon as I put some clothes on.»

«Ernie says just as soon as she can get dressed,» McCoy said.

«Damn you!» Ernie said. «You didn't have to say that!»

«Give me the address, again,» McCoy said, and reached for the pencil and notepad beside the telephone.

Ernie removed the towel from around her waist, balled it up, and threw it at him. She waited long enough for him to dodge the towel and then turned back into the bathroom and closed the door after her. But not before offering him a good look at her fanny and hips.

And she did that on purpose, too!

What I really want to do is go in there after her, pick her up, and carry her back in here.

He thought about that for a moment, then stood up, walked to the bathroom and pulled open the door, and scooped her off her feet.

«What took you so long?» Ernie laughed. «I was beginning to wonder if you'd lost interest.»

note 23

There are two things wrong with babies

, Captain McCoy thought, as he watched Ernie making cooing noises to the Sessionses' infant.

One, they make me uncomfortable. Second, sure as Christ made little apples, it will start Ernie off again, wanting one of her own. Our own. Damn

!

«Cute kid,» he said to Captain Sessions.

«You ought to have one of your own,» Sessions said.

Thanks a lot, pal.

«Listen to the man, Ken,» Ernie said.

I'd like to break his fucking arm!

«You said you have a new ID for me?» McCoy said.

«Yeah, come on in the study. I've got a briefcase full of stuff for you,» Sessions said.

«Oh, you're

so precious

!» Ernie said to Edward F. Sessions, Jr.

Ed Sessions stopped in his living room long enough to make drinks for both of them, then led McCoy into his study, which was slightly larger than a closet, and motioned McCoy into its one upholstered chair.

He picked a briefcase up from the floor, set it on his small desk, and began taking things from it. «You really should, you know,» he said, looking at McCoy.

«I really should what?»

«Marry her. Have a baby. That's what's it's all about, Ken.»

«Oh, for Christ's sake! What do you think my chances are of coming through this war alive, in one piece? The one thing I don't want for Ernie is to be a widow with a baby. Or a loyal wife taking care of a one-legged, or vegetable, war veteran for the rest of her life.»

«You've got to take the chance, Ken.»

«Can we change the subject, please, before I punch you out?»

«That would be assault upon a superior officer, punishable by death, or such lesser punishment as a court-martial may decree,» Sessions said solemnly. «Besides, I'm larger, stronger, and smarter than you are, capable, in other words, of whipping

your

ass. You should take that into consideration.»

«Can we get on with this?» McCoy said, with a glance in the direction of the briefcase.

«Okay. Except that I have to say that with the exception, of course, of Jeanne, they don't come any better than the one you walked in here with just now.»

«Yeah, I know. That's

why

I can't marry her. What's all that stuff?»

Sessions flipped him a plastic card.

«New identity card, to reflect the new railroad tracks on your shoulders. Incidentally, congratulations, Captain McCoy.»

«Sometimes I wonder if the Corps knew what it was doing,» McCoy said. «I don't think I'm qualified to be a captain.»

«That's horseshit. You're better qualified to be a captain than ninety percent of the people walking around with captain's bars.»

«Captains command companies. Do you really think I'm qualified to command a company?»

«Maybe the advanced officer course would do you some good,» Sessions said after a moment, and very seriously. «But you already have a more important qualification they can't teach you at Quantico.»

«Oh, yeah? What?»

«You know how to give orders,» Sessions said. «When you tell people to do something, they just do it, and think about whether it's smart later. Most people, most captains, including me, don't have that ability.»

McCoy met his eyes for a moment. «What other goodies have you got for me?» he asked.

Sessions handed him a stack of mimeographed orders. «That's your leave orders. Fifteen days. Administrative leave. It doesn't get charged against your accrued leave. DP.»

«DP? What's that?»

«Direction of the President. Your pal Major Roosevelt called the Colonel and said his father ordered that personally.»

«He's not my pal. I was a second lieutenant on the Makin Raid. Specs was the skipper, and a captain.»

«Tell

him