Free The Ninth Configuration by William Peter Blatty Page B

connection.
    “What are you doing?” Fell asked.
    “We’re going to need some supplies.”
    “What for?”
    “We are going to give the men their ‘safety valve’ to the greatest possible degree. We are going to indulge them monumentally.”
    “Precisely how do you propose to do that?” Fell asked.
    Kane explained it.
    Fell looked troubled. “Do it in writing,” he advised. “Don’t you think?”
    “Oh?”
    “It’s a little far out for most people, not to speak of the military mind,” reasoned Fell. “If I were you, I’d lay the arguments out on paper.”
    “You think so.”
    “Give the imbeciles something to look at. Pieces of paper make them feel more secure.”
    Kane thought. Then he buzzed and canceled the call, and Cutshaw burst in upon them, exclaiming, “We want to play Great Escape!” He pounded a fist on Kane’s desk. “We want shovels, picks and jackhammers!”
    Fell decided that Cutshaw must have been eavesdropping in the hall outside the office while Kane was explaining his new approach. He excused himself, went to his bedroom, telephoned the Pentagon general again and had an argument. He lost. That evening he flew to Washington and early the next day he resumed the argument in person. This time he won.
    On his return, Kane asked where he’d been.
    “Got an uncle in trouble,” Fell explained.
    “Can I help?”
    “You’re helping. Every kind thought is the hope of the world.”
     
     

 

     
     

    11
     
     
    Major Groper held on to the railing of the second-story balustrade and looked incredulously at a scaffold bearing Gomez as it creaked slowly upward toward the ceiling. On his way to “paint the ceiling like the Sistine Chapel,” Gomez was stirring one of several large buckets of paint.
    He hove up close to the adjutant. “Some weather,” said Gomez.
    Groper said, “Jesus Christ almighty!”
    He looked below. A pack of dogs of various breeds were yapping, barking and howling outside a utility room that faced on the main hall. Krebs held their tethers. Groper saw Kane emerge from his office and walk over to the sergeant. The door to the utility room flew open, disclosing an agitated Reno. Looking into the room, he commanded, “Out! Get out! Take a walk!” A large chow padded out of the utility room, and Reno called after him acidly, “Tell your stupid agent never to waste any more of my time!”
    Reno saw Kane and approached him, outraged. “Can you imagine?” he said.
    “He lisps! Here I am casting Julius Caesar and the idiots send me a dog that lisps!” He turned and called back into the utility room. “You too, Nammack! Get lost!”
    Out came Nammack, clad in a brand-new blue-and-red Superman costume.
    “But why?” asked Nammack. “Tell me why! Just give me one reason that makes any—”
    Reno interrupted, exasperated. “Colonel Kane, would you do me a favor? Please? Would you kindly explain to this imbecile here that in none of the plays of Shakespeare can there be a part for Superman?”
    “There could be, the way I explained it,” Nammack sulked.
    “The way you explained it!” Incredulous, Reno whirled on Kane. “You know what he wants? You want to hear? When the conspirators draw their knives, he wants to rescue Julius Caesar! Honest to God! He wants to swoop down like a rocket, pick him up and then go hurdling mighty temples at a single, incredible bound! He—”
    Paint splattered down in gobs, and Reno looked up and saw Gomez. “Fucking bananas,” he murmured. “Bananas!” Reno told the sergeant, “Next!” and Krebs released the leash of an eager Afghan. Reno escorted it into the room. “You bring any photographs with you?” he asked as he closed the door.
    Price appeared before them. He was encased in a NASA space-suit, a simulated flying belt on his back. He spoke through a miniature loudspeaker system built into the suit. “Any news from Earth?” he asked Kane in a voice that resonated electronically. He turned down the volume.