Sayonara Read Online Free PDF Page B

shoulders.
    I studied the maps in the general’s waiting room and browsed through his copy of the
Infantry Journal,
but my reading was disrupted by the general shouting, “Why in hell do you want to marry her, anyway?”
    Then I heard the colonel argue more persuasively, “But, Private Kelly, if you do marry her you can’t take her back to the States.”
    Kelly’s response was muffled but judging from what happened next the kid must have said, “I don’t want to go back to the States,” because the general shouted, “By God, I’ll send you back whether you want to go or not. Colonel, send this young whippersnapper home. Tonight!”
    That was when I first heard Kelly’s voice. He said, “I won’t go.”
    The general exploded. “You won’t go!”
    Kelly said, “That’s right, because Congressman Shimmark has arranged it for me to get married.”
    I have found that no matter where you are in the military—Army, Air Force, Navy, it doesn’t matter—things quiet down when somebody mentions Congress. I remember hearing about the time my father was stuck in the Philippines without supplies. It was during the battle when he got his fourth star and MacArthur could drop dead and Nimitz was a bum and he would bust Roosevelt in the nose. But a five-foot-four-inch Congressman appeared and Father became as smooth as butter. Because he knew that Congressmen run the military. They approve the budget.
    So General Webster retreated before the name of CongressmanShimmark. “All right,” he blustered, “go ahead and ruin your life. I’ve done my duty. I’ve tried to stop you.” Then he apparently turned to the colonel, for he snapped, “Arrange the young fool’s wedding. Next we’ll be running a nursery.”
    The colonel was grim-lipped as he led Kelly back into the waiting room. “Who do you think you are,” he muttered savagely, “speaking to a general that way?”
    Kelly said with great finality, “I ain’t takin’ no more pushin’ around. I’m gettin’ married.”
    The colonel showed him to the door and said, “You’ll regret it as long as you live.”
    Kelly looked at the colonel and laughed. Then he saw me and shrugged his shoulders again. “Saturday,” he said through the corner of his mouth.
    When he had gone the general appeared. He was red in the face and mumbling. “By God, in the old days we’d have thrown an insolent moron like that into the stockade. Now it’s the new Army, and every young pup writes to his Congressman. Damn, I wish all Congressmen would drop dead.” Quickly he looked about the room to see if anyone had heard this remark.
    The colonel tried to make a joke and said, “You can’t stop men from marrying women!”
    The general looked at him as if he had gone off his rocker and growled, “But you can keep officers of the United States Army from making utter fools of themselves in public. And by God I will.”
    Then he saw me and, taking me by the arm, said, “Lloyd, I certainly do wish the imbeciles I have under me were sensible like you. But then you’ve been reared in a tradition of service to the nation. You understand what a uniform means.” He looked for his Cadillac, which hadn’t yet returned, and called for a Buick instead. As soon as we got inside he said, “Speaking of Eileen, let’s eat.”
    “I wasn’t speaking of Eileen.” I laughed.
    “I was,” he said “Because…I mean…it’s inconceivable that these officers you see parading Japanese girls could ever have known clean, decent American girls like Eileen….”
    He turned abruptly and his voice sputtered like a volcano gasping for air. Across the street stood the fat major and his window-shopping Japanese girl. They were looking at dresses, holding hands in the spring sunshine. The general leaned forward and asked his driver, “Isn’t that Major Bartlett?”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “A shoe salesman in civilian life,” the general snorted. “What can you expect?”
    The driver corrected him.