"No, I didn't. So lady officers can only order other lady officers around?"
"That's the way the army likes it, Billy. At least among the Nurse Corps, anyway. I can't even order the dumbest, lowest private to empty a bedpan."
I stopped. I needed to go left, down the hall to Walton's office, and Gloria seemed to be propelling me along for the ride to wherever she was headed.
"Yeah, but I bet you could ask real nice and get him to do what you wanted." I said it with a smile, and she didn't miss a beat.
"I might try that out on you someday, Billy." She peered up at me through long eyelashes, and I could almost see her licking her lips. "Say hello to your lady friend for me. I checked up on her this morning, and she asked me to tell you she was feeling much better."
"You did? She seemed okay?"
"Fine, she's fine. I've got to go, Billy. We've got some new doctors arriving and I need to check on arrangements for them. See you later, sweetheart." She turned, fluttering her fingers in a wave.
"Oh, wait a second, Gloria. I wanted to ask you, do you remember after the aid raid, when you told me that Lieutenant Mathenet was being treated for a shrapnel wound?"
"Yes, I do. I ran into you when you were visiting that poor French boy who died…"
"Jerome."
"Yes, Jerome… Dupree it was. You asked me if the Lieutenant was going to be taking him into custody."
"You told me he was being treated. Who was caring for him?"
"Why, I'm certain I don't know. The fellow stumbled into the emergency room, with blood running down his arm. I pointed him to the triage area and that was the last I saw of him."
"Did you look at his wound?"
"I could tell it wasn't very serious by the small amount of blood. But no, I didn't look at it closely. Why, is he having a problem with it?" Her eyebrows rose with the question, all professional curiosity.
"No, it's healing up fine. I just wanted to check on who was where and when. Routine cop stuff."
"Sorry I can't help. See you later, Billy." She gave me a little wink and sashayed away.
I nodded and watched her go. It took a hell of a woman to make a career out of the Army and put up with everything she had to contend with. Pompous doctors, low pay, and no respect for her rank. For the first time, I wondered why. What did Gloria Morgan get out of the bargain? I wondered about that as I walked down the hall, knocked on Colonel Walton's door, and entered his office.
"Goddamn it Boyle! I thought I'd seen the last of you! I'll tell you something…"
Walton got up from behind his desk and advanced on me, wagging the two fingers holding a cigar, ashes falling on the carpet in front of him.
"Now I've got Headquarters troops standing guard in my own hospital, like goddamn prison guards. That Major Harding of yours is a pain in the ass!"
He went back to his chair. I was thinking about telling him I agreed, when he wheeled around and pointed the cigar at me again.
"And you're not much better! Take a seat."
I did. I waited a minute in silence as he puffed on his cigar, staring me down through the smoke.
"You're not as stupid as you look, Boyle," he finally said. "A lot of guys would try to calm me down by explaining themselves. Shutting up is hard for most people."
"What do you need explained, Colonel?"
"Why Harding is bringing in these men, for starters. And why in hell I got orders from HQ to cooperate with you!"
I held up one hand, fingers outstretched.
"Two murders, one theft, an idiot doctor, a crooked supply clerk… What did I leave out?" I looked at my five fingers.
"Petty pilferage. Goes on all the time. I didn't mind losing those two anyway. Dunbar was a prissy sonofabitch and Willoughby deserves to be at the other end of the supply chain. If you investigated every CO when some supplies go missing, you'd have a lifetime occupation."
"But those supplies are drugs, Colonel."
"Wake up, Boyle. I run a hospital here. Of course drugs are missing. If it were a paratroop outfit it'd be jump boots. If it were the Air Corps it'd be leather jackets. If it was Headquarters it'd be champagne."
"Good point, Colonel, but we're talking about this hospital and what's gone on here. Plus, we don't really have champagne that much. Bushmills, yeah." I tried a smile.
"Bullshit is more like it. Ask your goddamn questions, and be quick about it."
I could tell Walton didn't like being pressured to cooperate, and he wanted me to know he didn't like it. Question was, is this the way the guilty party would react? Answer was, maybe, if he were cool and smart. Walton seemed more the fly-off-the-handle than the cool-calculating type to me. I thought I should start easy so he wouldn't fly off that handle and beat me over the head with it. I looked at the books lining the shelves and thought about the first time I came into his office.
"Colonel, you've got everything here from Gray's Anatomy to the U.S. Army Manual for Courts-Martial. Are you a doctor yourself? Regular Army?"
"No and no. I was a kid in the First World War, infantry. I went to medical school when I got back, but it wasn't for me. I went to work at a hospital instead and ended up as Chief Hospital Administrator, Detroit General. Then the war came along and the army needed to build up the Medical Corps overnight. That's my job, to organize and make things happen in a hurry. Best way to do that in the Army is to know every damn regulation backward and forward, and bury those desk-jockeys at HQ with paperwork if they give you a hard time."
"And the medical texts?" I gestured with my thumb toward Gray's Anatomy, the only book with a title that I could understand.
"I like to keep up. Keeps the MD bullshit factor down if I understand every third word."
"Can anyone come in here and borrow them?"
"No one needs to."
"But if they did?"
"The door's locked when I'm not here. My clerk across the hall has a key if he wants anything. I suppose anyone could ask to borrow a book."
"Is this where you play poker too?"
"Yep. And you're not invited."
"Okay, Colonel. Now a more important question. Do you know who bandaged Lieutenant Mathenet's wounds after the air raid?"
"No fucking idea."
"Do you keep records of that sort of thing?"
"For a little scratch, right after we've been bombed by the Nazis? If we had to hospitalize someone, then yes. Otherwise it's just gauze and tape and get the hell out."
"Is that the only working telephone in the hospital?" I pointed to the ornate French-style telephone on his ornate table.
"Yes. Probably the only one for miles around. The Signal Corps ran a wire out here, straight to this room. That's it."
Time for the harder questions. I figured I'd build up to the big one.
"Why do you think Sergeant Hotchkiss deserted in England?"
"Now that's a mystery I'd like solved. No idea. Not in his character. He up and disappeared one day, no warning, no explanation. His gear, jeep, everything."
"You certain he deserted?"
"Apparently he did. Captain Morgan saw him leave that night, and he was spotted in town the next day. Then nothing. What else could've happened?"
I didn't feel like going into all the possibilities. Next question.
"When did you first learn the destination of your unit?"
"About six weeks before we shipped out, I was told to prepare for two eventualities. One was that Spain was considering getting into the war on our side, and that we should prepare to move to the Pyrenees on the Spanish-French border. The other was that Vichy France was going to come over to us, and that we should prepare to set up a hospital in Algiers as a preliminary step to moving into France."