From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [398]
It was possible they might send somebody around from the Provost Marshal’s office, but he doubted it. Fatso Judson was not worth that much to the Army, or to the Stockade. Fatso Judsons were dime a dozen in any outfit. There was at least one of them in every company, and usually there were more. The Commandant of the Stockade—
—lets see, he thought going over them in his mind, who was it? He watched an almost endless parade of officers’ faces, then his mind stopped the film and backed up to one of them. Thompson, the mental dossier informed him, Major Gerald W Thompson, formerly of the Umteenth Infantry, commanded I Co as a Captain, moved to Battalion Adjutant, on to Regimental Aide-de-Camp, made Major in charge of S-3 Plans & Training, graduated to Post Headquarters and promoted to Commandant of the Stockade; the one whose wife both Holmes and Culpepper use to take up on the Honouliuli trail riding—
—anyway, he thought, still proud the old automatic filing system functioned so perfect, Thompson would already have another Fatso Judson already in stock. And plenty more on the waiting list. We got at least two of them in this outfit: Liddell Henderson and Champ Wilson would both make good Fatso Judsons with a very slight proper training.
No, he did not think anybody would be around. But if they did he would still be covered. The day they came around was the day he would have just discovered Prewitt was gone. And, if they did prove anything, he was still covered. The furlough would cover him. Let Choate and Dhom take the blame, the sons of bitches, they started it. But when a whole compny went stone-deaf and blind on a thing like this you did not have to worry much. Nobody would rat; Dhom and Choate sure wouldnt; the only one who would be likely to rat would be Ike Galovitch, and who the hell would listen to an old nut like Ike who was busted for Inefficiency? But even Ike wouldnt have the guts to speak in the face of all this opposition.
Having figured it out to his own satisfaction, he crushed out the foul-tasting cigaret that he had not wanted anyway and, on second thought, got up and went to the filing cabinet and got out his bottle that he had been careful to mark with indelible pencil before he left on furlough, and took a big drink for his hangover.
It tasted very thin.
Has that sly quiet son of a bitch Rosenberry been watering my whiskey?
No, it wouldnt be Rosenberry. Not Rosenberry. It was probly more likely that fucking son of a bitch Dhom!
He took another big drink, because it was thin, and then sat back down at his desk, still in the dirty crumpled but prize $120 Brooks Bros, powder-blue tropical-worsted that he had given so much thought to before he picked it to wear on his idyll. He was thinking that that was what a man got for trying to take a little time off. They not only fouled up his Morning Report for him but they watered his goddam whiskey. It was getting so you couldnt trust no son of a bitch any more.
Not even yourself.
The hotel—inn, they called it—had been out in Kaneohe Valley, perched up high on the shoulder of the Koolau Range above the valley where the mountains made their inside-curve to the west to include the Nuuanu Pali. He had selected it very carefully, both for esthetic reasons and because it was the only place on the Island where they could go safely without being seen by somebody, like that sharp-eyed son of a bitch Stark. They had driven over the Pali in the U-Drive to get there, after he had taken her off the boat for Kauai to visit a sister that Holmes had brought her down to and seen her off on. Just like the goddamned iceman who comes in the backdoor as hubby goes out the front to the office. He just barely got her off the son of a bitch before they cast off the gangplank, Holmes hung around for so long.
Karen always loved to drive over the Pali. This time he stopped and pointed the hotel—inn, they called it—out to her in the blue distance haze across the steep drop. It was strictly a tourist hotel—inn, they called it—but in a class with the Halekulani, so that nobody but the most e-lite tourists even knew about it. He had happened to go there once before on a weekend back when he had been working on the Molokai moonlight cruises. That was how he happened to know about it. This time, he had already called up ahead of time and chartered a two-room corner suite on the third (and top) floor with the big windows looking off down across the valley to the sea on one side and right back into the mountains on the other. This time he was going to make sure it was perfect ahead of time. This time there werent going to be any loopholes. It was a beautiful view. It was also very secluded and very exclusive. It was really a very beautiful hotel—inn, they called it. Th