“Bobby’s pinning my new insignia on for me,” Jack said. “I don’t know where it all goes.”
Bellmon looked at the tunic and then at Jack.
Jack handed him a copy of his orders.
“Felter?” he asked when he had read them.
“Yes, sir,” Jack said. “Colonel Felter thought it would solve a lot of problems if I was commissioned.”
“And he arranged it?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Does Marjorie know?”
“Marjorie’s pissed,” Bobby said. “She called him a ‘damned fool.’ ”
Bellmon shook his head, then looked at Jack.
“May I show these to Bobby?” he asked.
“Yes, sir, of course.”
Bellmon handed the orders to Bobby, then turned to Jack.
“There’s no question in my mind that, with your professional qualifications and character, you’ll make a fine officer, Jack,” he said, and put out his hand. “Congratulations.”
“Thank you, sir,” Jack said.
“And it will solve a lot of problems about your marriage, won’t it?” Bellmon said.
“That may be on hold, sir,” Jack said.
Bellmon looked at him for a moment.
“Marjorie’ll come around,” Bellmon said. “I think what she had in mind was you being out at the Instrument Examiner Board, and not in Vietnam, and is honest enough to admit it.”
“Yes, sir. I think that’s it.”
“You start working for Felter, you may both wish you were in Vietnam,” Bellmon said, then added: “Sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. I just found out that Johnny Oliver is also going to work for Colonel Felter, and I’m a little less than thrilled about that.”
“Yes, sir, I’d heard.”
“Well, first things first,” Bellmon said, and went to a cupboard and took out a bottle of Martel cognac and three snifter glasses. He poured drinks and handed glasses to Jack and Bobby.
“A successful career, Jack,” he said.
“Hear, hear,” Bobby said, then touched glasses.
“When you have Lieutenant Portet’s insignia where it should be, Bobby, call Captain Hornsby, and tell him to provide places at the head table tonight for Lieutenant Portet and his lady,” General Bellmon said.
“Yes, sir,” Bobby said.
[ TWO ]
Dining Room A
The Officers’ Open Mess
Fort Rucker, Alabama
2115 18 December 1964
Dining Room A of the officers’ open mess was usually the cafeteria. It was on the main floor of the club, separated from it by folding doors. When it was in use for a more formal purpose, such as the Commanding General’s Christmas Dinner-Dance, the glass-covered steam trays of the cafeteria serving line were hidden by folding screens, and the plastic-topped tables rearranged and covered with linen.
The tables tonight had been arranged in a long-sided U, with a shorter line of tables in the middle of the U. Seating was determined by protocol, modified slightly by the unanticipated presence of Brigadier General Paul Hanrahan and First Lieutenant Portet and his lady.
The commanding general and his lady sat, naturally, at the head of the table, in the center of the U. To their left sat the chief of staff and his lady, and to the right, Brigadier General Hanrahan. No one sat across from the general officers and their ladies.
People were seated on both sides of the legs of the U, their proximity to the head of the table determined, for the most part, by their rank, and sometimes by their seniority within that rank.
A corkboard the size of a sheet of plywood mounted on the wall of the small office of General Bellmon’s aide-de-camp had been used. Every invitee was represented by a small piece of cardboard on which had been typed his name, grade, and date of rank. These were thumbtacked to the corkboard onto a representation of the arrangement of the tables in Dining Room A, and rearranged as necessary.
One of the things that would be useful to him in his later career that Johnny Oliver had learned during his tour as aide-de-camp was that General Robert F. Bellmon looked forward to the official parties (there were half a dozen a year) with slightly less enthusiasm than he would look forward to a session with the post-dental surgeon where the agenda was the removal, without anesthesia, of all of his teeth.
This was not evident to the guests, or to their wives. Bellmon had decided that the parties, which were more or less an Army tradition, were part of his duties, and his duty was very important to him. He and Mrs. Bellmon, and the chief of staff and his wife (and both aides-de-camp, who took turns discreetly whispering the invitees last name, read from invitations), stood in the foyer for forty-five minutes, shaking hands with, and smiling at, and more often than not coming up with a