From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [64]
He laughed out loud, throwing it out defiantly against the sound-blanketing curtain of the rain, feeling in him the smoking sparking pinwheel of the coming profanation of the sacred mark of caste. Maybe she wont even be home, he told himself. Yes she will, she’ll be there.
He took the papers out from inside his raincoat to see if they were wet. They were authentic letters, ones Holmes really should have signed before he left. Always be prepared, boy scout, he grinned.
He stopped a moment, grinning more, before the bulletin board just inside the doorway. On the side that had been stencilled PERMANENT was a copy of McCrae’s In Flanders Fields printed in red old-English type on vellum and with the margins adorned with tortured figures in the pancake British helmet of the War. Next to it was a poem called The Warhorse by an unknown general, Retired, of the World War, the first World War, comparing an old soldier to the old firehorse who came running every time the bell rang. Then there was Col Delbert’s latest memorandum right beside it, complimenting the troops on their spirit and athletic prowess and esprit de corps, all tangible results, the memo said, of their high moral character, as propounded by the Chaplain and the Sex Hygiene Lectures, although this was more or less implied.
Warden crossed the hall and started down the other stairs and then he saw the two colonels from Brigade standing in the dusky corridor with its varnished glassfront trophycases talking, the rest of the hall now at two o’clock deserted and the office doors, except for Sgt/Maj O’Bannon’s who practically lived in his, closed. He had hoped there would be nobody around and he looked closely at the colonels to make sure they didnt know him. He looked just a little bit too long.
“Oh, Sergeant,” one of them called. “Come here, Sergeant.”
He came back up the three or four steps and walked over to them and saluted, restraining a powerful urge to look at his watch.
“Where is Colonel Delbert, Sergeant?” the other one asked, the tall one.
“I dont know, Sir. I havent seen him.”
“Has he been in today?” the fat one asked, his voice wheezing a little. He wiped his forehead with a handkerchief and unbuttoned the rainwet shiny gabardine of his topcoat that was identical to that of the tall one except in shade of color.
“I’m sure I couldnt say, Sir,” Warden said.
“Dont you work here, Sergeant?” the tall one asked narrowly.
“No, Sir,” Warden said, thinking fast. “I dont work in Hq. I have a company, Sir.”
“What company?” the short one wheezed.
“A Company, Sir,” he lied. “Sergeant Dedrick of A Company.”
“Oh of course,” the short one wheezed. “I thought I knew you. I make a point to know our noncoms in Brigade. You just slipped me.”
“Dont you know enough to report when you come up to an officer, Sergeant?” the tall one rasped.
“Yes, Sir, but I have some business to attend to and I guess I had it on my mind.”
“Thats no excuse,” the tall one rasped, militarily. “How long have you been a noncom, Sergeant?”
“Nine years, Sir,” Warden said.
“Well,” the tall one said. Then he said, “You should know enough to watch things like that then. I’m certainly glad none of your men were here to see the example you just set.”
“Yes, Sir,” Warden said, wanting to look at his watch. If he would just only brace me now, he thought. Thats all we need. We could play like back at the Point, upperclassmen hazing the Dumbjohns.
“Carry on, Sergeant,” the tall one said. “And in the future be more careful.”
“Yes, Sir, I will, Sir.” He saluted quickly and made for the stairs, before the other changed his mind. Holmes’s wife might be going out this afternoon; if she was, and they made him miss her . . . He laughed, inside, to think what those two would think if they had known what he was thinking.
“He sure was in a hurry,” he heard the fat one wheeze.
“My god,” the tall one said. “They dont care who they give rockers to any more. It didnt use to be like that.”
“Dedrick always