U.S.A_ - John Dos Passos [300]
Her sharp brisk voice surprised her. "Come outside a minute, Joe, I want to walk around a little." The rain had cleared the air. It was a transparent early summer night.
"Look here, Joe, who's responsible for the condition of the planes? I've got to know."
"Daughter, how funny you talk . . . what you ought to do is get some sleep, you're al overwrought." "Joe, you answer my question." "But Daughter, don't you see nobody's responsible. The army's a big institution. Mistakes are inevitable. There's a lot of money being made by contractors of one kind or another. Whatever you say aviation is in its infancy we al
knew the risks before we joined up."
"If Bud had been kil ed in France I wouldn't have felt like this . . . but here . . . Joe, somebody's directly re-sponsible for my brother's death. I want to go and talk to him, that's al . I won't do anything sil y. You al think I'm a lunatic I know, but I'm thinking of al the other girls who have brothers training to be aviators. The man who inspected those planes is a traitor to his country and ought to be shot down like a dog." "Look here, Daughter," Joe said as he brought her back to the hotel, "we're fightin' a war now. Individual lives don't matter, this isn't the time for lettin' your personal feelin's get away with you or em-barrassin' the authorities with criticism. When we've licked the huns'l be plenty of time for gettin' the incompetents and the crooks . . . that's how I feel about it."
"Wel , good night, Joe . . . you be mighty careful yourself. When do you expect to get your wings?" "Oh, in a couple of weeks." "How's Gladys and Bunny?" "Oh, they're al right," said Joe; a funny constraint came into
-282-his voice and he blushed. "They're in Tulsa with Mrs. Higgins." She went to bed and lay there without moving, feeling desperately quiet and cool; she was too tired to sleep. When morning came she went around to the garage to get her car. She felt in the pocket on the door to see if her handbag was there that always had her little pearlhandled revolver in it, and drove out to the aviation camp. At the gate the sentry wouldn't let her by, so she sent a note to Colonel Morrissey who was a friend of Dad's, saying that she must see him at once. The corporal was very nice and got her a chair in the little office at the gate and a few min-utes later said he had Colonel Morrissey on the wire. She started to talk to him but she couldn't think what to say. The desk and the office and the corporal began swaying giddily and she fainted.
She came to in a staffcar with Joe Washburn who was taking her back to the hotel. He was patting her hand saying, "That's al right, Daughter." She was clinging to him and crying like a little tiny girl. They put her to bed at the hotel and gave her bromides and the doctor wouldn't let her get up until after the funeral was over.
She got a reputation for being a little crazy after that. She stayed on in San Antonio. Everything was very gay and tense. Al day she worked in a canteen and evenings she went out, supper and dancing, every night with a dif-ferent aviation officer. Everybody had taken to drinking a great deal. It was like when she used to go to highschool dances, she felt herself moving in a bril iantly lighted daze of suppers and lights and dancing and champagne and dif-ferent colored faces and stiff identical bodies of men danc-ing with her, only now she had a kidding line and let them hug her and kiss her in taxicabs, in phonebooths, in people's backyards.
One night she met Joe Washburn at a party Ida Olsen was giving for some boys who were leaving for overseas.
-283-It was the first time she'd ever seen Joe drink. He wasn't drunk but she could see that he'd been drinking a great deal. They went and sat side by side on the back steps of the kitchen in the dark. It was a clear hot night ful of dryflies with a hard hot wind rustling the dry twigs of the trees.