From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [395]
“Well of all the goddam ways to run an outfit.”
“Well,” Baldy said impassibly, “what the hell? This is your orderly room. I ony ride shotgun on it. And,” he said, “I figure he might even come back in of him own self before you got back.”
“Oh,” Warden said. “You figured he’d just come back.”
“Thats right.”
“Say, what the hells eating you?”
“Nothing, why?”
“Since when is Prewitt such a goddam good friend of yours?”
“He aint.”
“Then why the hell try to cover up for him?”
“I didnt. I just figured he’d probly come back.”
“But he didnt though, did he?”
“Nope,” Baldy admitted. “Not yet.”
“And you’re left holding the sack.”
Baldy shrugged massively and looked at him with the open innocence of a guilty man who knows he is safe just the same.
“Hell, First. I thought you’d be glad I waited for you to handle it.”
“Horse shit!” Warden hollered. “Now I’ll have to pick him up retroactive to the 16th—what month is this? October—retroactive to the 16th of October. How the hell you think thats going to look on the Morning Report?”
“I was ony trying to do you a favor,” Baldy said.
“Do me a favor hell!” Warden bellowed.
“Okay,” Warden said, he ran his fingers tearingly through his hair, “all right. Just tell me one thing. How’d you manage to keep it a secret from the rest of the Compny?”
“What do you mean the rest of the Compny?” Baldy asked blandly.
“Now dont tell me they didn’t even notice he was gone now?”
“I never thought about it,” Baldy said. “But I reckon they did. But you see, like I said, Ross dont know none of them. They dont owe Ross nothing, either. And you know feather-head Culpepper, he never pays no tension to nothing. I mean—”
“I see what you mean,” Warden cut in. “Just one other thing. How did Choate manage to get it past Ike Galovitch? Dont tell me Ike’s in on it too?”
“Well, thats another thing,” Baldy said. “I hant got to that yet. You see, Galovitch aint the platoon guide of the 2nd Platoon any more. Galovitch is been busted.”
“Busted,” Warden said.
Baldy nodded.
“Who busted him?”
“Ross.”
“What for?”
“Inefficiency.”
“Whatd he do?”
“Didnt do nothing.”
“You mean Ross just up and busted him? For nothing? Under a blanket charge of inefficiency?”
“Thats right,” Baldy said.
It was like pulling teeth out of an elephant, if an elephant had teeth. “But he must of done something, Baldy.”
Baldy shrugged. “Ross seen him give close order one day.”
“Well I’m a dirty bastard,” Warden said happily. “All right, who’d he make in his place?”
“Chief Choate.”
“Well now I am a dirty bastard,” Warden said happily.
Baldy seized the opening. “So you can see how I wunt know nothing about it. Who’d ever of thought Choate would turn him in Present? Would you, First?”
“Oh, no,” Warden said. “Oh, no. Of course not.”
“And you know how Champ Wilson is with his platoon. He never pays any mind to whats going on. Especially during training season. You can see how it wasnt my fault.”
“Oh, sure,” Warden said. “All right,” he said, “what else has happened.”
“Thats all, I guess,” Baldy said blandly and got up from his chair. He always looked uncomfortable when he had to sit in a chair. “You care if I take the rest of the morning off?”
“Take the rest of the morning off,” Warden bawled. “What the hell for? What the hell did you do to rate a morning off?”
“Well,” Baldy said immovably, “its practicly noon already. Time I change uniforms and get out to the drillfield they be practicly ready to come in.” He paused in the doorway and looked back at Warden with a closed face. “Oh,” he said, as if just remembering. “Theres one other thing. You see the papers this morning?”
“You know I never read the goddam newspapers, Dhom.”
“Well,” Baldy said, looking at him, “Fatso Judson—you know? the Chief Guard of the Stockade?—he was killed the night before last down to the Log Cabin Bar and Grill. Somebody knife him in the alley.”
“Is that right,” Warden said. “And so what?”
“I thought you knew him,” Baldy said.
“I wouldnt know Fatso Judson from Bust