personal word of greeting for everybody who showed up.
Once, sometime during Johnny Oliver’s year’s tour as aide-de-camp, General Bellmon had come to his office late at night and found Oliver standing before the corkboard rearranging the guests for an official affair.
“It began, these official damned dinners, with the Brits,” Bellmon told him. “Regimental ‘dining in’ once a month. Good idea. Once a month they got together, shoptalk was forbidden, and they got a little tight. And it worked here, before the war, when there was rarely more than a regiment on a post. Thirty, forty officers on a post, including all the second lieutenants. This is out of hand, of course. But how the hell can you stop it? If it wasn’t for these damned things, a field-grade officer could do a three-year tour on the post and never get to see the commanding general except maybe at an inspection, or a briefing. And the wife never would. The most important element in command, Johnny, is making the subordinate believe he’s doing something important. If he doesn’t feel he knows the commanding officer . . .”
Johnny Oliver had also learned that sometimes getting to personally know the commanding general could get out of hand. Officers’ wives were the worst offenders, but not by much. One of the aides’ functions at official dinners was to rescue the general from people who had backed him into a corner, either to dazzle him with their charm and wit, or to make a pitch for some pet project of theirs, ranging from getting use of the post theatre for amateur theatrics, to revamping the entire pilot training program.
“General, excuse me, sir,” Captain Oliver had often said, to separate General Bellmon from pressing admirers, “General Facility is calling.”
General Facility was a white china plumbing apparatus hung on the gentlemen’s rest room tiled wall.
Nobody in the men’s room would bend his ear while the general was taking a leak. But from what Oliver had seen of the women, especially with a couple of drinks in them, the general would not be equally safe in the ladies’ room.
When Johnny Oliver entered the club, Captain Richard Hornsby, the new aide-de-camp—wearing, Oliver knew, his dress mess uniform for the first time—was standing, where Oliver had stood so often, behind General Bellmon, with a clipboard and a stack of invitations in his hand. He smiled, and softly said, “Captain Oliver and Lieutenant Bellmon.”
General Bellmon put out his hand.
“Good evening, sir,” Johnny Oliver said.
“Good evening, Captain,” Bellmon said. “An officer is judged by the company he keeps. Try to remember that.”
Then he withdrew his hand and offered it to his son.
“Good evening, sir,” Bobby said.
“Good evening, Lieutenant,” Bellmon said. “I’m glad you could make it.”
Barbara Bellmon violated protocol. After she took Captain Oliver’s hand, she pulled him to her and kissed his cheek.
“We’re going to miss you, Johnny,” she said.
“Me, too,” John Oliver said.
“So will I, Oliver,” the chief of staff said.
“Thank you, General,” Oliver said, touched by the comment.
“Well,” Mrs. Chief of Staff said, “you’re only going to Benning. We’ll see you.”
Next in the reception line was Brigadier General Paul R. Hanrahan. Oliver knew that he was in the reception line only because Bellmon had insisted that he be there. If it was true that it was a good thing for officers remote from the command post to shake the hand, and look in the eye, of the commanding general, it therefore followed that it was a good thing for officers to do the same thing with visiting (and in Hanrahan’s case, near-legendary) general officers.
“Hello, Johnny,” Hanrahan said.
“Good evening, General.”
“Do me a favor?”
“Yes, sir. My privilege.”
“Keep an eye on Colonel Lowell, amuse him, see if you can keep him out of trouble.”
“I’ll do what I can, sir,” Oliver chuckled.
The two bachelors entered Dining Room A. Captain Oliver spotted Lieutenant Colonel Craig W. Lowell at almost the instant Lowell spotted him. Lowell was standing near the bar, holding a drink in his hand. He looked, Oliver thought, splendiferous in his uniform. He was in the center of a group of people, predominantly female. Oliver remembered what Mrs. Bellmon had said about Lowell attracting the ladies as a candle draws moths.
Lowell beckoned to Oliver with his index finger. The three of them walked over.
“Good evening, sir,” Oliver said.
“Lieutenant Bellmon,” Lowell said by way of greeting. “Now that you’re here, go around and locate our place cards—mine, Oliver’s, Lieutenant Portet’s, Marjorie’s and yours—and relocate them to one of the tables at the rear