Catch-22 - Heller, Joseph [150]
‘Oh, no, no, no,’ the chaplain assured him. ‘Of course not. Do you really live in the forest?’ The captain nodded, and the chaplain gazed at his porous gray pallor of fatigue and malnutrition with a mixture of pity and esteem. The man’s body was a bony shell inside rumpled clothing that hung on him like a disorderly collection of sacks. Wisps of dried grass were glued all over him; he needed a haircut badly. There were great, dark circles under his eyes. The chaplain was moved almost to tears by the harassed, bedraggled picture the captain presented, and he filled with deference and compassion at the thought of the many severe rigors the poor man had to endure daily. In a voice hushed with humility, he said, ‘Who does your laundry?’ The captain pursed his lips in a businesslike manner. ‘I have it done by a washerwoman in one of the farmhouses down the road. I keep my things in my trailer and sneak inside once or twice a day for a clean handkerchief or a change of underwear.’
‘What will you do when winter comes?’
‘Oh, I expect to be back in the squadron by then,’ the captain answered with a kind of martyred confidence. ‘Chief White Halfoat kept promising everyone that he was going to die of pneumonia, and I guess I’ll have to be patient until the weather turns a little colder and damper.’ He scrutinized the chaplain perplexedly. ‘Don’t you know all this? Don’t you hear all the fellows talking about me?’
‘I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone mention you.’
‘Well, I certainly can’t understand that.’ The captain was piqued, but managed to carry on with a pretense of optimism. ‘Well, here it is almost September already, so I guess it won’t be too long now. The next time any of the boys ask about me, why, just tell them I’ll be back grinding out those old publicity releases again as soon as Chief White Halfoat dies of pneumonia. Will you tell them that? Say I’ll be back in the squadron as soon as winter comes and Chief Halfoat dies of pneumonia. Okay?’ The chaplain memorized the prophetic words solemnly, entranced further by their esoteric import. ‘Do you live on berries, herbs and roots?’ he asked.
‘No, of course not,’ the captain replied with surprise. ‘I sneak into the mess hall through the back and eat in the kitchen. Milo gives me sandwiches and milk.’
‘What do you do when it rains?’ The captain answered frankly. ‘I get wet.’
‘Where do you sleep?’ Swiftly the captain ducked down into a crouch and began backing away. ‘You too?’ he cried frantically.
‘Oh, no,’ cried the chaplain. ‘I swear to you.’
‘You do want to cut my throat!’ the captain insisted.
‘I give my word,’ the chaplain pleaded, but it was too late, for the homely hirsute specter had already vanished, dissolving so expertly inside the blooming, dappled, fragmented malformations of leaves, light and shadows that the chaplain was already doubting that he had even been there. So many monstrous events were occurring that he was no longer positive which events were monstrous and which were really taking place. He wanted to find out about the madman in the woods as quickly as possible, to check if there ever really had been a Captain Flume, but his first chore, he recalled with reluctance, was to appease Corporal Whitcomb for neglecting to delegate enough responsibility to him. He plodded along the zigzagging path through the forest listlessly, clogged with thirst and feeling almost too exhausted to go on. He was remorseful when he thought of Corporal Whitcomb. He prayed that Corporal Whitcomb would be gone when he reached the clearing so that he could undress without embarrassment, wash his arms and chest and shoulders thoroughly, drink water, lie down refreshed and perhaps even sleep for a few minutes; but he was in for still another disappointment and still another shock, for Corporal Whitcomb was Sergeant Whitcomb by the time he arrived and was sitting with his shirt off in the chaplain’s chair sewing his new sergeant’s stripes on his sleeve