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

«Which you decided didn't apply to you?»

«Sticking around waiting to get killed or become a prisoner when there were other options didn't make much sense to me,» Weston said.

«In other words, sometimes what people expect you to do—the conventional morality—doesn't make any sense?» Martha asked, and added: «I've come to the same conclusion myself.»

Now, what the hell does she mean by that?

«So, what I think happened was that Paulsen reported me KIA,» he said. «He had to report something. If he reported me AWOL, they would have put my name on the list of probable deserters, and the MPs would have been looking for me.»

«So you did what you thought was the right thing for you to do, right? And to hell with what other people thought you should do?»

«Yeah, I guess you could put it that way,» he said.

«I'm really glad you did, Jimmy,» she said, grasping his hand. «You're here. You're alive.»

He exhaled audibly.

Martha drained her drink and stood up. «I have to go to the ladies' room,» she said. «Order me another drink?»

«Don't you think we'd better call it a night?»

She looked at her watch.

«It is getting late,» she said. «Pay the bill. Meet me in the corridor.»

He nodded, watched her walk out of the cocktail lounge, and looked around for their waitress.

He was waiting for her in the corridor, beside the elevator, when she came out of the ladies' room.

She walked past him to the elevator.

«Good. It's here,» she said. «Come on.»

«Where are we going?» '

«I told you I had something to show you. I don't want to show it to you in the corridor.»

He stepped onto the elevator. She pushed the door close and stop buttons.

«Somebody's going to want to use the elevator,» he said.

«This won't take long,» Martha said. She reached for his hand and put something in it, then leaned against the wall of the elevator, smiling at him.

He looked down at his hand. At first he thought the small, foil-wrapped package was a piece of candy. Then he recognized it for what it was really was. «What am I supposed to do with this?» he asked.

«I think you know what it's for,» she said.

«Martha, that wouldn't make any sense at all.»

«Don't be a hypocrite, Jimmy,» she said. «You want to as much as I do. You've been looking up my dress all afternoon.»

«I'm sorry you saw that,» he said.

«You shouldn't be.»

He looked at her.

«I'm not going to beg you, you sonofabitch!» she said.

She turned from him to the row of elevator buttons.

«Which one do I push?» she said. «Your call.»

He didn't reply until she turned to look at him over her shoulder. He saw tears forming in her eyes.

«Six,» he said.

She pushed the button, the elevator started to move, and then she was in his arms.

«That's the second time I bought one of those things from the machine in the ladies' room,» Martha said.

They were lying in bed, on their backs, staring up at the ceiling.

«What?» he asked.

«Consumed with guilt, are we?» Martha said, and then went on. «I always wondered why they had a condom machine in the ladies' room. To protect the ladies? Or the men?»

«Jesus, Martha!»

«The first time I bought one, he was willing, but when I went to his room, I wasn't. Actually, it was the penthouse, here in the San Carlos. He was a very rich, and very nice, really, young Marine Aviator, and he told me he was in love with me. Maybe if he hadn't said that, I would have gone through with it. Anyway, I didn't. You're the first man since Greg, if you've been wondering. And since he was the first, you're number two.»

«Oh, Christ, Martha!»

«I've had a number of offers, of course,» she said. «But aside from… the very nice, very rich young aviator… I never really wanted to. And I didn't go through with that. Until today, when I saw you get out of the car, I had just about convinced myself that whatever I was, I was not the Merry Widow of fame and legend. You know what that means, really, in German?»

«What?»

«The title of that operetta,

Die Lustige Witwe

? Popularly known as

The Merry Widow

? Lustige means 'lusty.' Full of lust.»

«Oh, for Christ sake!»

«But when I saw you get out of your car, I realized I was wrong. I was suddenly very

lustige

indeed.»

«Martha, for Christ's sake!»

«And now that you know, are you really disgusted with me, or do you think, as a kindness, you could force yourself to put your arms around me? Right now, I feel very lonely.»

He reached for her and wrapped his arms around her and comforted her as she sobbed against his chest.

«I thought I was going to die when Greg got killed. I did, inside. And then I started having fantasies about you. Jim would come home. Jim would comfort me.»

«Jesus!»

«Today wasn't the first time I've caught you looking up my dress,» she said, her sobs turning into giggles. «Thought I didn't notice? I noticed!»

«You're really something, Martha.»

«And then

you

were KIA, you bastard!» she said. «And I really died inside all over again. And then you came back from the dead, and

didn't

call, and I understood that I'd been a little crazy, thinking that you felt anything for me—or I felt anything for you. And then, you bastard, you show up without warning at the house, and started looking at me like that.»

«You mean looking up your dress?»

«That too,» she said. «But I meant the look in your eyes when you saw me. You know the first thing I thought when I saw you?»

«I'm afraid to ask.»

«Actually, the second thing. The

second

thing I thought was that I was really glad I hadn't gone to bed with… the nice young man.»

«What was the first thing?»

«You'll never know. You can probably guess, but I'll never tell you.»

«And what are you thinking now?»

«I'm thinking you don't seem very enthusiastic. Anyway, it's time for you to take me home, or Daddy will get suspicious.»

«I didn't expect this, Martha,» he said. «I'm trying to sort it out.»

«You've got to learn to take a chance,» she said. «Go for broke. Hope for the best. Like I did when I bought two of those things in the ladies' room.»

He didn't reply.

She pushed herself up and looked down at him.

«I'm getting the feeling I'm making you uncomfortable,» Martha said. «If I am, for God's sake, don't try to be a gentleman.»

He touched her nipple with his finger.

«Only

two

? You should have bought three, four, half a dozen.»

She moved her body so that he could get his mouth on her nipple.

«Is that what you were thinking? Is that what you wanted to do?» she asked.

«Oh, God, yes,» he said.

«I told you I always know what you're thinking,» Martha said, as she pressed her breast against his face. «Oh, God, Jimmy, I'm so glad you're back!»

Chapter Eleven

note 40

The Greenbrier Hotel

White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia

0440 8 March 1943

Under the military administration of the Greenbrier Hotel, the desk clerk was called the charge of quarters. Whatever he was called, he was the same petty officer second who had the duty when Weston reported in, and he was asleep in an armchair behind the desk when Weston walked up to ask for his key.

Weston took a certain cruel pleasure in ringing the bell on the desk with sufficient energy to bring the charge of quarters to sudden wakefulness.

Jim Weston was not in a very good mood. He had driven straight through from Pensacola, stopping only for gas and a couple of really terrible hamburgers. During that time, he'd had plenty of time to consider what an unprincipled miserable sonofabitch he was, first for what he had done to Martha, and second for what that meant with regard to his relationship to Janice.