The Colonels, page 15
part #4 of Brotherhood of War Series
That set off a line of kisses. Having kissed Barbara, he had to kiss Sharon and Roxy as well. It occurred to him that it was an extraordinary coincidence that the only three women in the world he didn’t mind kissing were at the same table. He then congratulated MacMillan on his promotion, sincerely, for in many ways he liked and admired the simple Scot and was happy for him and Roxy.
Lowell realized that there were more medals for valor on display here than at any other table in the club. The army didn’t pass out that many Distinguished Service Crosses, and the one on his own lapel was duplicated on the lapels of Felter and MacMillan. And that didn’t count Mac’s Medal of Honor, the only one on the post. Nor the Medaille Militaire and Legion d’Honneur on Jean-Philippe Jannier’s blouse. Nor the Silver Stars and Bronze Stars and Purple Hearts on just about every other Combat Developments officer. There was an exception, of course. To judge by the ribbons adorning the breast of Colonel Tim F. Brandon, the Pentagon Press agent, the man had somehow managed to rise to colonel without ever having heard a shot fired in anger.
He made the effort and smiled at Colonel Brandon. Except for Brandon, he liked everybody here, and he decided to stay.
If Bill Roberts didn’t like it, fuck him. War between them had already been declared.
Peace in our time, he thought, is just not possible.
“Madame le General,” Lowell said, “would you do me the honor of dancing with me?”
“Only if you promise to do something that will make people gasp,” Barbara Bellmon said, giving her husband a broad smile as she got to her feet.
Major Craig Lowell and Madame le General danced very close with Barbara’s lips next to his ear—like teenagers in love—because they knew that annoyed Bob Bellmon.
Barbara told him she didn’t know what to think about Melody showing up, and hoped that it would simply be passed over.
“But don’t believe for a minute that I swallow that tale about her being here because of Jannier,” she said. “And it wasn’t at all nice of you to set him up like that.”
“If I had said I had asked her, you know what people would have thought.”
“I wouldn’t have,” Barbara said.
“You would have stood alone,” Lowell said.
“Probably,” she agreed, and chuckled.
Once he had danced with Barbara, he had to dance with Sharon Felter and Roxy MacMillan. Sharon Felter told him that she was happy “the way things have turned out for you” and that she wanted to thank Craig for making Sandy come to Rucker.
Roxy MacMillan had had enough to drink to put her in a jovial mood.
She told him, as they danced, that the first time she’d seen a blue mess uniform was the one he had worn at Knox.
“Mac looks good in his,” he said. “He even looks dignified.”
“We’re a long way from Mauch Chunk,” Roxy said.
“We’re all a long way from where we were,” he said. “You even learned to play a passable round of golf.”
PFC Craig Lowell had met Captain MacMillan’s wife on the Constabulary Golf Course in Bad Nauheim, Germany, where he had then been an assistant pro.
“It’s going to be good having you around, Romeo,” Roxy said, laughing.
“Thank you, ma’am,” he said.
“Who’s going to replace Bob Bellmon?” she asked, suddenly serious. “You must have heard.”
“I don’t know, Roxy,” he said, truthfully. “Hainey, I would guess. If Bellmon knows, he hasn’t confided in me.”
“Mac had the nutty idea they’d give it to him.”
After a moment, Lowell said, “It calls for a bird colonel.”
“Mac’s sometimes not too bright about things like that,” Roxy said.
“Mac wouldn’t like the job if he had it,” he said.
“Tell that to him,” she said, a little bitterly, and then lightened her voice. “We do go back a long way, Romeo, don’t we?” Roxy asked.
“Yes, we do.”
“You better go back where you belong, Craig,” she said.
“I like it where I am,” he said.
“The story I get is that you’ve promised to behave,” Roxy said. “Behaving means being with the Board. You’re just going to make things worse with Roberts by hanging around with us.”
“I’m very afraid you are very perceptive,” Lowell said.
“Take me back to the table, and then go back where you belong,” she said.
“Your wish is my command,” he said.
Holding hands, they started back to the stairs to the balcony. Then, all of a sudden, Lowell pulled Roxy toward the bar.
“Where the hell are we going?” she asked.
“I just solved a problem,” he said. “You just agree with me, understand?”
“I’d like to know what the hell’s going on,” she grumbled, but followed him into the bar.
Melody Dutton Greer was sitting on a bar stool. With her were Captain Jean-Philippe Jannier, Warrant Officer Junior Grade William B. Franklin, and several junior officers he didn’t know, but whom he presumed were friends of the late Lieutenant Edward C. Greer. Melody Greer was visibly tight.
Roxy saw this and said so: “Christ, she’s bombed!”
“Good evening, children,” Lowell said. “I am about to issue orders, so everybody pay close attention.”
The young officers he didn’t know looked at him resentfully.
“Yes, sir,” Melody Greer giggled and saluted.
“Melody,” Lowell said, “when you’re ready to go, which means when you finish that drink, Jean-Philippe will drive you home in your car. Bill will follow you in his car, so he can bring Jean-Philippe home. Is that clear, or does someone have a question?”
“I can drive myself home,” Melody said, sharply.
“Listen to him, honey,” Roxy said.
“Yes, sir,” Melody said, saluting Roxy and giggling again.
“My car is at Hanchey, Major,” Franklin said. “I’ll need a ride out to get it.”
Lowell put his hand in his pocket, came up with the keys to the rented Chevrolet, and handed them to Franklin.
“Take mine,” he said. “It’s in the parking lot, way at the end by the chapel.”
“Bring it back here?” Franklin asked.
“Pick me up in the morning for breakfast,” Lowell said. “Then we’ll go to Hanchey and get yours.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, that’s settled then,” Roxy said.
Melody Dutton Greer took Lowell’s arm and pulled his face to hers. She kissed him on the cheek.
“When you’re right, you’re right,” she said. She turned to Roxy. “Will you tell the Bellmons good night for me?”
“Sure thing, honey,” Roxy said.
Melody slid off the stool and looked as if she was going to stumble. Jannier and Franklin caught her arms. Then they all walked out of the bar together and to the door.
“Now you go back to the Board,” Roxy said.
“Yes, ma’am,” Lowell said.
“You handled that pretty well, Romeo,” Roxy said. “Sometimes you can be a very nice guy.”
He climbed the stairs back to the Board area. When he got to his table, there were three men, two officers, and a civilian there.
Introductions were made. The officers were a major and a captain from the Department of Tactics, and the civilian was “with the Enterprise Banking Company.” They were the other members of Tom Cassidy’s hunting party.
“I was hoping to see you again before we left,” Tom Cassidy said.
“I’m glad I got back,” Lowell said.
“I’m trying to make up my mind whether I want to go home, or stay,” Jane Cassidy said.
“There’s no reason for you to go home,” Tom Cassidy said.
“And if you go home,” the banker argued, “Phyllis will think she has to go home.” He turned to Lowell. “My wife is with the others…”
“The hunting widows’ social club,” Jane Cassidy said, a little bitterly.
“Oh, do whatever you want, Jane,” Tom Cassidy said, impatiently.
“Go catch your plane,” Jane Cassidy said.
The men shook hands with Lowell. Cassidy kissed his wife.
“Happy New Year,” she said.
The men left.
Jane Cassidy looked up at Lowell.
“Logic tells me that I should get my coat and go home,” she said. “But he was right, if I did that, Phyllis would take it as disapproval. Would you mind if I stayed?”
“Of course not,” he said.
“In that case,” she said, “you’ll have to face the hunting widows with me. So that Phyllis will understand that I approve.”
“All right,” he said.
She took his arm as they went down the stairs. Then as they walked past the dance floor on their way to the Department of Tactics tables, she suddenly turned into his arms.
“They’re playing a waltz,” she said. “And I’ll bet you can waltz.”
“Can’t everybody?”
She laughed a little bitterly.
They waltzed. Craig Lowell waltzed well. He had spent three hours every Saturday afternoon in his thirteenth year at a dancing school. It was his studied judgment that most women who liked to waltz did so badly. Jane Cassidy was the exception. They began sedately, but as they sensed the good dancer in each other they began to swoop gracefully around the room. By the time the dance was over, there were only four couples on the floor. The others had stopped to watch, and when the dance was over, there was applause.
Holding hands, Jane curtsied, and Lowell bowed elaborately. There was more applause and laughter, and then she hugged him. He was acutely aware of the pressure of her breasts against his abdomen, the soft warmth of her back under his fingers.
And then she took his hand and led him to the table where the other hunting widows were sitting.
It was a large table, and introductions took some time. It would have been rude to refuse the drink he was offered, so he drank it. And he made small talk until he thought he could leave Jane with her friends without giving the impression he didn’t care for their company.
He had just said his good-byes when the band began playing “Goodnight, Sweetheart.” He looked at his watch and saw that it was almost midnight.
“If you were to ask, Major Lowell,” Jane Cassidy said, “I would grant you the favor of the New Year’s midnight dance.”
She was already on her feet.
They danced again with six inches between them, but the smell of her hair and the warmth of her back had the same effect on him as dancing with her before had had. She was dancing with her head back, so that she could look up into his eyes.
And then the lights flicked on and off, on and off. The band stopped playing, and people began to count downward from fifteen. It was almost the New Year.
He looked down at Jane Cassidy and smiled. She hadn’t let go of his left hand, and was standing so close to him that he could feel the pressure of her breasts on his arm.
The countdown finished. Everybody was kissing their partners. He bent to kiss Jane, chastely, because she obviously expected him to—and because he wanted to. He expected to get her cheek, and instead got her lips. Somebody lurched into them, first banging their teeth together, and then apparently pushing Jane’s elbow, for he felt her lower wrist and the back of her hand against his erection. She would know, he knew, what it was.
“Whoops!” he said.
“Crowded,” she said.
The band played “Auld Lang Syne,” and everybody sang. Jane sang enthusiastically, swaying with the music, swinging the hand she held, looking up at him and smiling. When “Auld Lang Syne” had finished, the lights dimmed, and the band began to play again. He started to dance with her once more.
“We were cheated out of our socially permissible New Year’s kiss,” she said, pulling back to look at his face. He bent to kiss her again, telling himself this time on the cheek. But he got her lips again, and he just had time to marvel at the softness of them when her tongue came between them. Her middle came in to meet his, and he felt his erection pressing against the softness of her belly.
There came a scream, and then a crashing noise, and then silence, and then a male voice said, “Ooooooooooh, shit!”
(Two)
Lieutenant Colonel Rudolph G. MacMillan had a load on. First he’d had a couple of beers on the golf course with Sandy Felter, and then a couple more in the house before the general and Bob Bellmon and everybody had showed up with the photographer. They’d all killed three bottles of champagne after that, and he had been drinking bourbon since they had come to the club. A lot of bourbon. There had been a lot of people who had heard about his promotion and had insisted on buying him drinks. He could hardly turn them down or they’d think the promotion had gone to his head.
It wasn’t an entirely happy occasion, his promotion notwithstanding. For one thing, it was so soon after they’d buried Ed Greer that a party didn’t seem quite right. It made him feel a little guilty that he was here, all in one piece, and what was left of Ed was in the cemetery in Ozark. He could just as easily have been flying the Big Bad Bird. He wondered if it would have gone in, if he’d been flying it.
For another, he’d brought up to Bob Bellmon his chances of taking over Combat Developments now that he was a light bird. Bellmon had quickly shot him out of the saddle on that one. No chance. Bellmon gave him the same excuse Roxy had, that the TO&E called for a full bull colonel, but Mac had known that was so much bullshit. If they’d wanted to give it to a light bird, they would have. They just didn’t want to give it to him, and probably because he hadn’t finished high school. He thought that he should have been able to prove by now that he was just as smart as any of the others, high school diploma or no high school diploma, but that wasn’t the way it worked. They gave command only to a certain kind of officer, one who had all the punches on his ticket.
Bellmon had told him that if he wanted him to, he thought he could arrange for MacMillan to be ordered to the Pentagon, to work for him in DCSOPS.
That was the last goddamn thing he wanted. A newly promoted light bird in the Pentagon ranked about as high as a corporal did here. Light birds in the Pentagon were errand boys most of the time, sent out to the snack bars to bring the full colonels and the generals their morning coffee and rolls. He wanted nothing to do with that kind of crap. He was a soldier, not a paper-pusher.
He wasn’t even going to get the rocket helicopter project. General E. Z. Black had ordered the whole project transferred to the Aviation Board. He couldn’t go with it, because Black had given it to Lowell. Besides, Mac didn’t want to work for Bill Roberts, anyway.
Sending the project to the Board was so much bullshit, too. The Board was supposed to test equipment, not tactics, and the only equipment they had was the H-19 Lowell had stolen. The project should have stayed with Combat Developments until they really got it started. Mac thought there was politics involved. It must have been a real kick in the balls to Roberts when they gave Bellmon a star and made him Director of Army Aviation. Roberts had certainly expected that promotion—and that job—himself.
What really had happened, Mac thought, was that Colonel Tim F. Brandon, the Pentagon PIO—without whose bullshit Ed Greer would probably still be alive—had suggested that the Big Bad Bird go to the Board. Proud as hell, the sonofabitch had told everybody that he had recommended Lowell for the job for the public relations value. If he’d wanted to, Bellmon could have choked off that dumb idea right from the start. Maybe he hadn’t been all that enthusiastic about the Board getting the Big Bad Bird, but he had gone along with it to try to make Bill Roberts feel better. They may not like each other, but they had to work together. It was for damned sure that Bellmon hadn’t been very pissed about Mac not getting it.
And then Melody Greer had shown up. That had really got to him. Ed not yet cold in the ground, and here she was at a party in an evening dress with her boobs damned near falling out of it. He hadn’t thought Melody was like that. But he was out of step with the rest of the fucking world about that, too. He thought the Bellmons would have a fit when they saw her walking down the balcony hanging onto Lowell’s and that frog officer’s arms, but they hadn’t. They had acted like it was the most natural thing in the world for a widow with her husband hardly cold to go to a party.
“Oh, Melody!” Barbara Bellmon said, sweet as hell, as if it was the most natural thing in the world for a widow to do, “I’m so glad you decided to come. I was afraid you wouldn’t.”
And they’d found a seat for her and Lowell, too, right next to the Bellmons, which had meant moving the adjutant and his wife to the next table. And then Bellmon had even danced with her, and Mac had watched them from the balcony and had seen that even if Lowell and Bob and Barbara Bellmon didn’t think there was anything strange in a widow going to a party so soon after her husband had gotten himself killed, a lot of other people in the club did. As many people stared at Bellmon and Melody as had stared at Lowell when he was dancing with Phil Parker’s wife.
Mac thought that what Barbara Bellmon should have done was take Melody aside someplace and politely let her know that she didn’t look much like an officer’s lady doing what she was doing. Or Lowell should have told her. Except you couldn’t expect Lowell to do something like that. Lowell didn’t give a shit what anybody thought, which was proved by the way he danced with Parker’s wife.
It wasn’t Melody’s fault. She was just a kid, not more than twenty-two or something like that, and she really hadn’t been around the army all that long, so somebody should have told her. Nicely, but they should have told her, and they didn’t. Melody was a nice girl, and he felt sorry for her. Ed was a good guy, and they’d obviously been happy, and it was a dirty goddamn shame, him getting blown away that way.
Roxy, who would have jumped off the goddamn balcony if Barbara Bellmon jumped first, had gone along and pretended that she didn’t think there was anything wrong with Melody being here. She had even told Mac to dance with her. There was no way he was going to do that, and he said that to her, and then she told him not to raise his voice at her. And that pissed him off the way it always did.
