CHAPTER TWO
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The sun flushed into the sea, its final rays in uniform columns shone like the spears of past Roman legions turned loose to pick up litter on the Appian Way. The lines of light glanced at the big sewage pipes draining under the waves like a fifth column of flashers infiltrationg a nudist colony. As the sun descended, the strafing shadows cut down the beach and the fallen grains of sand stumbled seaward along a large black bundled telephone cable.
Lide Rommel executing the Blitzgrieg, the phone cord looped around the desk, around the pistachio-green receiver, and around the crisply creased trouser leg. The man in the pressed slacks, spit-polished shoes, starched shirt, and happy-face tie pin straightened to attention, straightened to the traditions and pride of his uniform. Rommel gave the order. The man bounced off the floor somewhat at ease of his former carriage.
"I want to make a collect call," the voice barked the command.
"I'm sorry the President doesn't accept charges."
"Tell him it is Camille," he declared like an officer rallying his men to attck breakfast.
The voice, believing it was caught behind enemy lines, whispered through the receiver, "I told you not to call me at the big house. Is this an emergency, Camille? You're not, are you? I knew we should have been more careful. You know I can't be responsible . . . Tell me you're not . . . "
"Not what?"
"Hey, who is this?"
"General Chamelion speaking, Sir. Is that the President?"
He exhaled, "Yeh," then quickened, "What's wrong, have you been bombed?"
"I don't drink to excess."
"Were you attacked?"
"I don't go out alone at night."
"Did you attack anyone, any foreign power that is?"
"No. I received no order. Was I directed to engage in a halting action?"
"The exasperation evident in his tones now, "I don't know. Why did you call then?"
"Doggles, Sir. This is the off season and they are the major boon to our economy."
"Okay. I'll send you mor Majors."
"Doggles, Sir. We need the boon to our economy."
"What do you need with all those goggles? What's hitting the fan out there?"
"Doggles, Sir."
"Doggles? Doggles. Alright, I'll make a memo: Sixty thousand goggles to Camille order." Hoping to terminate the discussion, "How's that?"
"I didn't receive this month's completion cost payment."
"I don't know if we can get too many more out to you. The cost has already exceeded the bid and all our expectations, not to mention the time factor. Sometimes I think it would be cheaper to just put every soldier in the world on our payroll."
"We were the lowest bid and the most loyal."
"I know, I know. How is your program coming along?"
"Normal."
"I can at least carry that message to the congress and I'll remind them of your reconstruction efforts. Is that pretty well taken care of?"
"Most of the inoperative personnel have been shovelled in."
"Fine. I'll get back to you as soon as I hear from the Senators, so until then . . . "
"I want the F-One O'sham."
"You'll get one as soon as they're completed and just prior to the release of information citing their ineffectiveness, like always."
"I don't want one plane. I want all the planes."
"What's wrong with your mind, Chamelion? You sit on a grenade or something?"
"Get me at least one more completion cost payment and we'll have spent enough money to be one of the top defense firms under contract. That should qualify us to build the plane. You then need only transfer the funds already appropriated for its construction to us. As the sole supplier and lead purchaser, we can save everybody a lot of trouble by delaying our efforts till after the design becomes obsolete. You'll look good because I can guarantee a minimal amount of cost overrun."
"Your asking me to swing this? I'm tired of always having the ball in my court!"
The military leader in the General knew that calling the shots was a responsibility that weighed heavy on a playmaker and he sought to encourage his President, "Run with the ball, or walk fast and whistle like nothing's wrong. Above all, remember, even if its fourth and hundred and ten to go, the games not over till the final fumbling yard loser."
The President began to take heart from Chamelion and he wanted to convey that the General's trust in him was not misplaced, "Don't worry General, I won't let the guard down or get tied up in the clinches and get tagged by a knock-out punch."
It was again the General's turn to vocalize his support, "Not with me in your corner, weight i your gloves, spinach in your mouthpiece, and ice down your shorts you sure won't.
The President's voice was on the upswing, it began to affirm itself with emphasis, "A horse doesn't change jockeys in the middle of a race."
For his part, the General felt his cheeks go red with his fighting spirit and he marched his words through the receiver, "Not with the betting windows closed and the fix already on."
The President could no longer contain himself and he jerked to his feet and let his voice take on a hysterical pitch, "If I have to throw strikes, then I'm prepared."
The General was boiling in ecstatic fervor, "Peanuts! Popcorn! Steal second base or at least get it on sale."
Together they contorted in a mad frenzy of words, "When the fluff get going, the stuff gets stepped in."
Had the General remained on the line he would have heard the President command his secretary, "Get my cap and baton. I'm going to review the white House Guard."
The General slammed his receiver down and ordered his aide into his office. "Get my jeep ready. I will personally hand out the medals for this month's competition." The General grabbed his hat but as he fastened his pistol belt, he caught the phone around the buckle. In the ensuing battle to untangle it, he irreversibly knotted the receiver into his uniform. In a burst of rage, he yanked the receiver apart from its cradle. With the pistol at his side and the phone dangling on his buckle, looking much like a clerwerker on a very light stepping Viking, he charged to his jeep.
"Stop here. This is the winner of this month's Fort Wart Bunco Neat Award. Stick your thumb up your nose, Salamander, and stand at attention until I return."
"Yes Sir."
The General presented himself before each bunk and inspected it from floor to ceiling like an Australian Coastwatcher judging a beauty contest.
Before each bunk in the barracks stood a soldier, arms squared behind his back, eyes squarely ahead. From the flat of his head to the sides of his shoes, he was drawn so that pressure in a specific direction produced a specific reaction. The General pinned the troops. Each man now had a metal he could flap from his uniform like an Easter Seal on a letter bomb.
"Soldier, this helmet has legs on it."
"Yes Sir, that's my . . ."
"The army is explicit in this. No helmet shall have legs."
"Sir, it's not a helmet, it's a pet . . . "
"Soldier, march that helmet out of here."
An officer burst in, stepped over the legged helmet heading for the door, and breathless, like Pheideppedes with the news that the Series would not go seven games, said, "A representative from Grubber Munitions is here to see you."
"Salamander, we will drop by the distribution center on our way back."
As the outskirts of Fort Wart were approached, the General could see more of the country they occupied, the gently cratered hills, the thick rich colors of defoliated vvegetation, the now parched land below the dam that was once under fifty feet of water from a misdirected bomb, the native people quaintly attired in their traditional dress lounging in the sun occasionally thrusting a starving paw out of their torn rags to beg bread or sell themselves to a passing soldier.
The distribution center was painted black, the best camouflage for midnight supplies. The General opened the black door and he was immediately hit with the hustle of activity that pervaded the building. Forklifts assaulted unmarked crates, men inspected piles of nameless boxes and directed others to proper locations. It was like a war fought through a dating service. The General was pleased, "Ah, this is the Army."
"It's good to see you over this way, Chamelion," said a captain in charge of a clipboard.
"I always feel at home here. It was in a similar installation that I received my first commsission. Guana, there will be a load of doggles through here shortly. You will receive approximately forty thousand. Keep twenty thousand, send twenty on. Someone from Grubber is here. I'll get back to you with details on the shares of our arrangements. Understand, Iggie."
"Gotchya, Camille."
As the General strode to his office, he queried his secretary in the same grueling manner he would use to extract vital information from a captured enemy midwife, "He inside?"
"Well General Chamelion, it's good to see you again," he pumped the General's hand like he was loading it with grapeshot. The General pulled his hand to free it and the cannon went off into the General's belly. "What does Grubber have for us today?"
The man unfolded his catalogue. "This month's special is a weekend for two, your date is already preparing herself, at a ski lodge. This has been a popular model with all the services."
"What must I purchase?"
"One contract to furnish your base with a variety of field weapons entitles you to this lovely vacation. However, for a mere second year extension, we will throw in a party for two on your own beautiful isolated island. Shall I put you down for both trips?"
"I do like isolated islands, they remind me of the big war."
"Both trips it is, then. We'll look forward to having you. I'd also like to show you our newest in strategic weapons. This comes from our chemical nasties team and is affectionately called the 'I Surrender Spray'."
"I employ this on my date?"
"No, no. It comes in an aerosol can marked 'Deodorant'. But we have added our own dryness formula. If I might have a subject, I could demonstrate its effectiveness."
"Salamander."
"Yes Sir."
"You will apply this spray." Salamander obediantly sprayed the deodorant under one arm, then the other. The aerosol quickly took effect.
"Sir, I can't lower my arms."
"You see General, the unconditional surrender."
"You're dismissed Aalamander."
Salamander ran his stomach into the doorknob. He tried to hook the knob in his pocket. Failing that, he rolled his body around the knob to try and make it turn. He had crouched in front of the knob and opened his mouth wide when the following words sent him sprawling.
"Come in."
Chamelion greeted his quest, "Premier Ngud Hud Lum, it is a pleasure to see you. What can I do for you?"
"I would appreciate a fighter plane. It would make my trips to the bank much easier."
Chamelion picked up the phone on his desk. "What do you have in the fighter line?" The voice travelled as far as Iggie Guana.
After a couple of minutes the reply came back, "Okay it's set. Two and a half and it's on the way."
"Is four million the best you can do . . . three and a quarter? That's better. I believe my client can work that out." The General looked at Ngud's head nodding in affirmation. "Fine, then get on it."
"Thank you, General. It is always best to present oneself at the source of the river if he wishes to travel downstream."
"Here in the service we often say, 'Go with the flow'. And remember, if you need it, it's in our inventory."
"I hve quite an inventory myself, Premier Lum. Perhaps you'd like to take a look at it, if the General doesn't mind." And the man from Grubber and Ngud went off to huddle over battle boards like buzzards over a fast food massacre.
"Send in Bugabooboo from intelligence." Before the General had released the button on the intercom, a man in earphones shuffled in like an infantryman who had invaded Russia in tourist shorts and camera.
"There is a Premier Ngud Hud Lum."
"Premier Ngud Hud Lum."
"What do you know about him? Is he pwerful?"
"Powerful," repeated Bugabooboo.
"You know about him. Keep an eye on him and report any suspicious movements. What do you hear from the states? What is our chance of getting any more contracts?"
"As sound as the dollar."
"Good."
"Research."
"Go ahead."
The man adjusted his earphones and moved closer to the General, at the same time he raised his voice, "There doing a lot of research in research."
"I hope they come up with tactical techniques directed towards today's world. We need to be able to infiltrate a metropolis."
"Yes. Infiltration techniques for urban fighting."
"That's good their working on it because we're talking about areas where divisions of foot soldiers are not going to mix with large white houses and stretches of lawn."
"White houses and long lawns," Bugabooboo picked up the General's laugh.
"So what did they come up with? There's lots of trees in suburbia."
"Trees."
"So their disguising the troops as trees. That won't do. Trees are stationary."
"No, no." Bugabooboo was shaking his head.
"Something that moves from tree to tree. I got it. Giraffes."
"That's it. Giraffe Warfare."
The General was impressed. This was information tantamount to the intelligence Washington got before Trenton when he was told the Potomac is cold in December. "I can feel safe knowing you're on the job."
A man dressed in at what first glance looked like an enemy uniform, stormed the door like the frontrunner in a battering ram. "Western Union. Sign here please."
While Chamelion penned his name, the man delivered a lovely bouquet of roses and some chocolates. "Now, who do you suppose sent this." Chamelion exploded into a smile of forty-five magnum teeth and fumbled over the card. "Oh, he shouldn't have. From Preseepoo. That was thoughtful."
As if to add to the mood, the black phone crooned, "Hello Camille, this is the President."
"Preseepoo. Thank you for the lovely roses and how did you know I like chocolates?"
"That's why I called . . . "
"But really you shouldn't have."
"I didn't. It was my staff."
"Well, thank your staff."
"You see, I had two directives and you got the roses and I'm afraid Camille got the Doggles."
"You mean I have to send them back. I haven't even tried a chocolate."
"Keep the chocolates, General. It's the Doggles, I can't get her to return them. camille's been at me because she never gets to stay in the big house or sleep in the Liberty Bell and now she's got the Doggles and she says she can have her own replica of the White House somewhere in New Jersey and she's talkin' tourists and . . . "
"We need those Doggles, but we'll take the F-One-O'sham."
"I've got some bad news about the F-One-O'sham but that's not my fault. It's my wife."
"Haven't I always been first to support you? So why is your wife first on the payoff list?"
"She's been blabbering at me about the wings, the wings this and the wings that. I assumed naturally she was talking about the East and West wings of the House, but she's building the plane in the back yard. I've got parts all over the house, the yard, the dog's got engine oil on his paws, it's a mess."
"Let me get this straight. No Doggles because your Camille wants to build a White House. No plane because your wife wants to build it in her back yard. What are we supposed to do for business? Do you have any foreign flare-ups? Any police actions?"
"Not now, but as soon as one opens up we'll consider your qualifications."
"You mean your closing our market."
"Not permanently."
"It was you who suggested we expand our enterprises. It was you who told us we'd gone as far as we could and it was time to put the screws to a new market. So what happens? I take your advice, expand, and find I'm right back where I started, sticking my hand to my forehead like an electric Santa Claus in January."
"Knock it off Camille . . . Not you General. Camille, that tickles. Excuse me for a moment General." The President was weakened with laughter like the firest GI to get a look at a Viet Cong.
The General motioned to Bugabooboo, "The President has turned against us."
Bugabooboo stuck the end of his earphones to the phone and heard the President's machine gun giggles. "He sounds far away."
The General pressed on like a Chinese laundryman spy on word of the Boxer rebellion. "You will get us an equivalent amount of money."
"I can't do that, I don't have cash like that on hand."
"You have credit."
"What can I borrow that much money on? I've got nothing as collateral."
~You are the President of the United States."
"I cna't rent the office."
"You can mortgage Montana."
"I can what?" his voice exploded through the receiver.
"You can mortgage Montana."
"Not possible. The controlling interests have already been parcelled long before me. You know that and if you're so short of funds, why don't you liquidate some of your assets."
"I run a military base, not a tax base. I'm your first line of defense and I will not be weakened. You give me no alternative, I must take action in your behalf."
"I don't think you understand the repercussions."
The General did not retort but he clearly heard the drums and in his mind, the beating framed his marching men.
"You're going to blow in big trouble."
The bugles blared "Boots and Saddles".
"I don't think you fully realize the difficulties . . . Camille, I thought I told you I won't have any more of this. Out. Get out. I've had all I can take."
Had the General remained on the line, he would have heard, "Oh, not you General." And in a few moments later, "Reconnect me. Use the direct line, the pistachio colored phone."
Instead the General turned to Bugabooboo who said, "What now?"
The General cocked his forefinger the way he remembered Richard Widmark did at the Alamo.
The President was on the direct line urgently trying to get hold of the General. The direct line, however, was not at Chamelion's ear but wrapped around his buckle. "General, you can't be reached. I can't reach you."
General Chamelion recognized the voice dive bombing from the heavens as that which carried the word to Achilles that he should wear sandals, Goering to practice his English, Custer to take up the horn. Like Joan of Arc, the General heard the voice, "Nothing gets through to you, Chamelion." Confirmed in his mastery over mortality, blessed in his invasion of vincibility, signalled by all the great Gods of war, Christ, Buddha, Lao Tze, secure in the heroic vision of every war movie made, the General was ready to pronounce, "Salamander, prepare the troops for Operation Slime."