From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [367]
“You’re the bait in the trap. They know how to work it, dont think they dont. What does dear mother do when sonny comes home from college all full of revolt and dissatisfaction with the way the world has always been run?
“They find him a sweet young thing thats around handy that he can get his gun off on and relieve himself and they finagle till they got him married to her, and then sonny quiets down to his duty and lets his revolt run off out through the head of his penis and accepts the status quo.”
“I’m not the bait,” Karen said. “I dont want to be the bait. I hate it as bad as you do. You must know that.”
“Do you think the pig tied in the trap for the tiger wants to be bait? And how much good does it do him?”
“Is that really the way you feel about it, Milt?”
“Thats the way I feel. All my life I’ve had to fight for one thing, the one thing nobody wants a man to be, to be honest. And now, to become an Officer— Did you ever see an honest Officer? that stayed an Officer?”
“Then you cant do it.”
Warden grinned at her combatively. “Yes, I can. And I will.” If she had told him he could do it, instead of letting him tell it to her, he would have been indignant and angry. But now, with her looking at him brimmingly admiringly, he felt a great sense of power that comes with accomplishment. “I’ll shove it up all their asses,” he told her, “and steal the bait out of the trap without springing it and to hell with them,” and he believed every word of it with her watching him proudly and he felt Milt Warden swell up stronger in Milt Warden then he had ever felt Milt Warden.
“We are just alike,” Karen said. “We’re just alike.”
“And I wouldnt trade a minute of it,” he said.
“Oh, Milt,” Karen said. “I dont want to be bait, Milt. I love you, Milt. I want to help you, not hurt you.”
“Listen,” Warden said enthusiastically. “I’ve got a 30-day re-up furlough coming to me that I’ve been putting off ever since I got in this Company. And I’ve got $600 downtown in the bank. You and me are going to take that furlough, to anyplace in the Islands you want to go, and we’re going to have us a time none of them will ever be able to take away from us, war or no war, hell or high water.”
“Oh, Milt,” she said softly, and in the saying of it made him feel finer than he could remember ever having felt in his life, “that would be wonderful. Imagine it, just the two of us, with no hiding and no acts to put on. Wouldnt it be wonderful.”
“It will be wonderful,” he corrected.
“Oh, if we only could.”
“We not only can; we will. Whats to stop us?”
“Nothing,” she said. “Nothing except ourselves.”
“Okay then.”
“Oh, dont you see, Milt? I couldn’t leave for that long. Its a wonderful dream, and I love you for it, but we couldnt do it. I couldnt leave Junior for that long.”
“Why not? You’re going to leave him for good someday,” he said doggedly. “Aint you?”
“Of course I am,” Karen said helplessly, “but thats different. Until I make the break I have a responsibility to him that I cant just shrug off. The poor little devil will have a hard enough time of it as it is, with the life he’s had all picked out for him. I owe him at least that much.
“Oh, Milt, dont you see? Its a dream. We couldnt get by with it. How would I explain my being gone for a whole month? Dana suspects something now, and if—”
“Let him suspect, the son of a bitch. He’s been true to you, hasnt he?”
“But we cant do that. We have to keep it a secret until you’ve gotten a commission and are out of his Company, the whole thing depends on that. Dont you see?”
“I’ve never liked hiding from him,” Warden said stubbornly, “who the hell is he I should hide from him?”
“Its not who he is, its what he is. You know that, Milt. And if I were to be gone for a month just at the same time you took your furlough . . .”
“I know it,” Warden said sullenly. “Its just that sometimes it gets my goat and I get sick of it.”
“Dont you think I get sick of it, too? I’m trying to set it up for us. How could I explain it?”
“You’ve got a cousin