“Bring in the infidel woman!” he shouted, as fiercely as he could, taking one last glance at himself in the mirror and, as he took satisfaction in this, framing a mental image of the terrified female he would in a moment face.
He would not, he thought, be too menacing, just menacing enough to accomplish his purpose. He looked expectantly toward the door. No one was entering.
“Bring in the infidel woman!” he shouted again.
A head of one of the palace servants peered nervously around the door frame.
“The infidel woman is not coming,” the servant said.
“What do you mean, she’s not coming? I have summoned her.”
“She said she is busy, Your Highness.”
“I gave explicit orders to the guards that she was to be brought to me, by force, if necessary,” Omar ben Ahmed said.
“Yes, Your Highness,” the servant said, “I remember you saying that.”
“Well, what happened?”
“She threw the guards out of the harem, Your Highness,” the servant said.
“What was she doing in the harem?” he asked, angrily.
“Delivering a baby, Your Highness,” the servant said.
“Who told her she could do that?” Omar ben Ahmed said.
“No one, Your Highness,” the servant said. “She just walked in, threw the midwife out and took over.”
“Where’s the Captain of the Guard?” Omar ben Ah med asked.
“Boiling water, Your Highness,” the servant replied.
“Why is this woman delivering her baby in the harem?” Omar asked. “In the name of my grandfather, I issued specific orders that women in … er, that condition … were to be taken to the hospital in Marrakech.”
“Her condition came on unexpectedly, Your Highness,” the servant said. “We would have sent her in the helicopter, except, forgive me, Your Highness, you were flying it.”
“How is she?” Omar asked.
“The mother or the infidel woman, Your Highness?”
“The woman, you moron!”
“Making a lot of noise, Your Highness.”
“I believe that’s customary,” Omar said. “Who is she?”
“Captain Kalih’s wife, Your Highness.”
At that moment, the unmistakable wail of a newborn baby filled the high-vaulted rooms of the palace.
“Shall I have the infidel woman dragged in now, Your Highness?” the servant asked.
Putting his sneer back on, Omar ben Ahmed strode off furiously in the direction of the baby’s crying. As he approached the harem, the door suddenly flung open, and a woman in white medical costume emerged. Blonde hair peeked out of her headdress.
Omar steeled himself. While he appreciated what she had done, she still had to be frightened.
“You’re the one I’m looking for!” Hot Lips said, pointing a finger at him.
“You are searching for me, mademoiselle?” Omar heard himself ask.
“Nurse Wilson to you, buster,” she said. “I saw a chopper land from the harem window. That was you, right?”
“Why, yes, it was,” Omar said.
“I thought so,” she said. “O.K., Hotshot Charlie, get out of that Rudolph Valentino suit and crank up the chopper. You’re running a medical-evacuation mission to the nearest hospital. I’ve seen some sloppy lash-ups in my time, but this pile of stones takes the cake.”
“Do I understand you to say you wish me to fly you … and perhaps the baby and the mother … to a hospital?” Omar asked
“What’s the matter with you? Can’t you speak English? Get cracking!”
The Captain of the Guard appeared, carrying a bucket of steaming water in each hand.
“Where do you want the water, Reverend Mother?” he asked.
“I told you to get moving!” Hot Lips said to His Highness. “You wouldn’t be the first chopper jockey I’ve booted in the tail!”
His Royal Highness Omar ben Ahmed turned on his heel and ran toward the helicopter landing pad. He told himself that he was motivated by humanity; his primary duty lay certainly in doing whatever was necessary to see that Captain Kalih’s wife and newborn child received the best possible medical attention. He could deal with the infidel woman later.
By the time he had started up the helicopter, as the blades began to rotate, Captain Kalih’s wife, the baby in her arms, was brought to the helicopter on a stretcher. She was loaded into the rear seat, and the infidel woman got in beside her.
“O.K., Hotshot Charlie,” the infidel woman screamed at him, “scramble!”
His Royal Highness devoted the next couple of minutes to the business of flying. He radioed ahead to Marrakech Approach Control, and received permission to land on the hospital roof. Helicopter transport of patients was a fairly standard procedure. It was an hour and ten minutes by chopper from the palace to Marrakech, and six-and-a-half days, presuming nothing went wrong, by ground transport.
“What exactly is wrong with her?” he finally asked, over his shoulder.
“Don’t tell me you still believe in the stork?” Hot Lips replied.
“I mean is there something specifically wrong with her?”
“She just had a baby,” Hot Lips replied, with barely concealed impatience. “Women who have babies, and the baby, belong in the hospital. Kabish?”
“Madame…” Omar said.
“Nurse Wilson, to you. I told you that!”
“Nurse Wilson, I am Sheikh Omar ben Ahmed,” he said, flashing what he had been told by other infidel women was a smile dazzling in its menace. Once the infidel woman, realizing now who he was, had a moment to reflect on her outrageous treatment of his royal personage, once she literally shook in her boots, he would graciously forgive her, because of her obviously valuable contribution to the welfare of one of his subjects.
“Well, Sheikh,” Hot Lips said, flushing just a little, “I’m flattered and all that, but … though I may not look it … I’m almost old enough to be your mother. You just fly the chopper and behave yourself.”
“What did you think I had in mind?” Omar asked.
“I know what you had in mind, sweetie,” Hot Lips said, and reached up and pinched his cheek. “And I told you I was flattered. If I was twenty years younger, I’d probably take you up on it. I always had a thing for tall, dark strangers. But, like I said, I’m almost old enough to be your mother. Besides, how would it look? The Reverend Mother Emeritus running around with some chopper jockey still wet behind the ears? People would talk, sweetie. You can see that!”
His Royal Highness peered out the window of the helicopter. He could not think of one word to say.
His eye caught, a thousand feet below him, just off to the right, four small, black specks. This was the heart of the desert. He gently changed course, remembering his passengers, to get closer. Then he picked up the microphone.
“This is Abzug Chopper One to Desert Patrol.”
“Go ahead, Chopper One.”
“I’ve got two people and two jackasses at coordinates Seventeen Twelve, Fifteen Six,” he said. “What are they doing there? That whole area of desert is off-limits.”
“Hold One, Chopper One,” Desert Patrol said, and then, a moment later, came back on the radio. “Nobody has been cleared through our checkpoints, Chopper One. It must be somebody trying to sneak into the country.”
“Don’t be absurd! Who would want to sneak into Abzug?”
“I don’t know. Just who do you think you’re talking to, anyway?”
“I don’t know who I’m talking to,” he replied. “But you’re talking to Sheikh Omar ben Ahmed.”
“Forgive me, Your Highness,” the voice replied con tritely, “I had no way of knowing.”
“You should have been able to figure it out,” Omar said. “We have one chopper, and one pilot—your beloved heir-apparent to the Sheikhdom.”
“Well, now that you put it that way, Your Highness, I suppose I should have figured that out.”
“Well, y
ou better send somebody out to get those jackasses out of there,” Omar ben Ahmed said.
“Just the jackasses, Your Highness?”
“Rescue the whole party, stupid,” Omar said.
“Right away, Your Highness. I’ll send out a camel patrol right away.”
“Let me know who they are,” Omar said. “Chopper One out.”
Thirty minutes later, the chopper fluttered down onto the roof of Marrakech General Hospital, and Mrs. Kalih and her baby were off-loaded.
“That’s a handsome child,” Omar ben Ahmed said as he watched the procedure. He felt it was his royal obligation to do so, even if it meant lying. Like all other newborn babies he had ever seen, this one was, viewed objectively, an object of rather spectacular ugliness.
“Thank you, Your Highness,” Mrs. Kalih said, beaming. Having gone this far, Omar went the rest of the way.
“And have you thought of a name for the little fellow?”
“Oh, yes, Your Highness,” Mrs. Kalih giggled shyly. Omar ben Ahmed was pleased. The child would obviously be named after him. “ ‘Hot Lips,’ Your Highness, after the infidel lady who brought him into the world.”
“An appropriate choice, I’m sure,” His Highness said.
“Don’t go anywhere, sweetie,” Hot Lips said to him. “Just as soon as I check her in, I want to go back with you.”
“Madame, I don’t have time to waste waiting around here!” His Highness said.
“Now don’t be a sorehead, sweetie,” Hot Lips said. “A gentleman takes a ‘no’ graciously.” She pinched his cheek again and marched into the hospital.
In five minutes, she was back. “They seem to know what they’re doing in there,” she said, approvingly. “Now are you going to behave, or am I going to have to ride in the back seat, out of reach?”
“Madame,” Omar ben Ahmed said, “please accept my assurances that I have no interest whatever in you or in any other infidel woman.”
“What do you mean, infidel woman? I’ll have you know, you mustachioed heathen, that you’re addressing the Reverend Mother Emeritus of the God Is Love in All Forms Christian Church, Inc.”
Omar didn’t reply for, even as he spoke the words ‘any other infidel woman,’ his mind was full of the delightful, soft, sweetly smelling infidel woman who had kicked his shin in the lobby of the Crillon Hotel.
He raised the helicopter on its skids, lowered the nose and took off.
“Watch it, Hotshot Charlie,” Hot Lips said, “your rotor r.p.m.’s dropping into the red. Let’s not bend the bird with the Reverend Mother in it.”
Omar’s mouth opened in shock, but automatically his eyes dropped to the rotor revolutions gauge; the needle showed that he was indeed on the edge of a hazardous flight condition. He hastily made the necessary adjustments to correct the situation.
“You want me to drive awhile, sweetie?” Hot Lips asked. “You look kind of shook.”
“You can fly a helicopter?” he asked.
“Oh, sure,” Hot Lips said, putting her hands on the controls. “I got it, sweetie,” she said. “You just sit back, relax and enjoy. What’s the heading, anyway?”
After a long moment, His Highness, a touch of respect in his voice, asked, “May I ask how it is that you can fly?”
“Well, sweetie,” Hot Lips said, “it’s none of that women’s lib nonsense, if that’s what you’re thinking. I personally like the idea of having men take care of helpless and feminine little me. It’s just that I had … a good friend … who taught me to fly one of these when I was in the Army in Korea.”
“You were a soldier in Korea?” he asked.
“I told you I was a little older than I look,” Hot Lips said. “I retired as a lieutenant colonel. And I asked, what’s our heading?”
“On the way here,” Omar said, regaining some composure, “I saw two men, two fools, leading two jackasses across the desert. I think we’d better have a look at them. Fly Two-One Nine True.”
“Two-One Nine True,” Hot Lips repeated, and the helicopter banked as she took up that heading.
“I didn’t have,” Omar said, biting the bullet, and admitting to himself that he really felt a sense of camaraderie with this amazing blonde woman, “a chance to thank you for what you did for Mrs. Kalih. Permit me to express, on behalf of Sheikh Abdullah ben Abzug, the appreciation of the Abzugian people.”
“What’s the matter with him, anyway?” Hot Lips responded.
“I beg your pardon?”
“I asked what’s wrong with him? How come he doesn’t have a hospital back at that so-called palace of his?”
“When our people need hospitalization, we take them to Morocco,” Omar said.
“Like now, huh?” Hot Lips said, sarcastically. “Don’t try to hand me that. Sheikh Whatsisname is blowing his job, and you know it.”
“Hospitals cost money,” Omar said, loyally.
“With the dough the old boy’s going to get from his oil, money won’t be an excuse.”
“You seem supremely confident that oil will be found,” he said.
“It’s been found,” Hot Lips said with certainty. “Horsey told me he smelled it the minute he got off the plane.”
“And who,” Omar sniffed sarcastically, “is Horsey?”
“Horsey is the world’s greatest oil sniffer,” Hot Lips replied. “He’s infallible. If he says he sniffs oil, you can bet your a … Arabian heart on it, there’s oil.”
His Highness, of course, regarded this as highly unlikely. At the University of Marburg, he had taken courses in geology; and what he had learned was that finding oil was a science, not something you did with your nose.
But there was no time to argue. To the left of the helicopter, perhaps a mile away, he spotted the people and animals he had seen earlier, on the way to Marrakech.
“There they are!” he said, and pointed, and Hot Lips banked the chopper in that direction. Omar’s worse fears were realized. The jackasses were no longer moving. They were standing, heads down, beside two prone forms on the sandy dunes.
“Were they moving the last time you saw them?” Hot Lips asked, all business.
“Slowly,” Omar replied, “but moving.”
“Then we may be in luck,” Hot Lips said, as she dipped the nose of the chopper toward the ground. “If you get to them within an hour or so of the time they lose consciousness, you can sometimes save them. You got some water aboard this thing?”
“Yes, of course,” Omar said.
“Well, if you think you’re all right to fly, I’ll take care of them. You think you can find Horsey and the boys?”
“Why?” he asked.
“We brought a field hospital in the plane,” Hot Lips said, “and they’re closer than either Marrakech or that so-called palace.”
“Right,” Omar said. “They’re right over that next range of mountains.”
“Landing one of these things in blowing sand is hairy,” Hot Lips said, professionally. “Stick your head out the window and sing out when you see the ground.”
“Don’t you think I’d better fly?” Omar asked.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Hot Lips snapped. “This is an emergency. No time for amateurs.”
His Royal Highness did as he was told and, thirty seconds later, the skids of the helicopter touched down on the sand dunes. Omar rushed out of the machine and ran to the first fallen figure. He was a short, fat Arab, and when Omar pushed aside his caftan to put his hand on his heart, he was surprised to see he was wearing the uniform of a high-ranking officer—an Inspector, of the Moroccan Gendarmerie Nationale. The heart was still beating. Omar then rushed to the other fallen figure and pushed its caftan aside so that he could put his hand on the chest to feel for a heartbeat.
At precisely the moment he realized tactilely that the Inspector’s comrade was of the other sex, the second figure opened its eyes (light-blue eyes, which produced a very strange physio-chemical reaction in His Highness) and spoke.
“I knew I’d see yo
u again, my darling, if only in Heaven,” the fallen figure said, and then lapsed into un consciousness again. Sheikh Omar ben Ahmed moaned loudly, and then scooped up Miss Penelope Quattlebaum and ran with her in his arms toward the helicopter. As he gently placed her in the back seat, Hot Lips ran up, with Inspector Gregoire de la Mouton over her shoulder.
“How come I got to carry the fat one?” she asked, as she dumped him unceremoniously beside Penelope. “O.K., sweetie, get this show on the road!”
Alerted by radio, the personnel of Chevaux Petroleum International’s Rig Number seventy-five were waiting when the helicopter fluttered to the ground fifteen minutes later.
Even before the rotors had stopped spinning, two huge, bare-chested men had carried Penelope Quattlebaum off on a stretcher toward a prefabricated building which bore the sign: FIELD HOSPITAL AND EXPLOSIVES WAREHOUSE.
Once he had seen the short, fat man loaded onto another stretcher, Omar ran toward the hospital, but was barred at the door by the shorter of the two men.
“Hot Lips says nobody goes in there,” he said.
“Will she live?”
“Hot Lips said all she needs is some water,” the man said.
“Thank God!” Omar said.
“Friend of yours, is she?”
“In a manner of speaking,” Omar said, and then realized the time had come for him to face facts. “Actually,” he said, “I fear it’s a bit more than that.”
“Horsey’s my name,” the man said. “What’s yours?”
“You’re the oil sniffer?” Omar asked. “The Reverend Mother told me about you.”
“I didn’t catch the name.”
“My name is Omar,” he said.
“Come on, Omar, I know what you need,” Horsey said, taking Omar’s arm and leading him to another prefabricated building, this one with a sign reading: ANNEX NUMBER SEVEN, BAYOU PERDU COUNCIL, KNIGHTS OF COLUMBUS, LOUNGE.
It was dark in the building, and Omar was so momentarily confused that he thought he was perhaps suffering from heat exhaustion himself. He was in a bar. He had, purely as an educational experience, of course, visited several bars while a student in Germany, and he knew a bar when he saw one. There was a line of beer taps, serving a line of beer drinkers. At one end of the bar, one man wept bitterly as another man tried to comfort him. Two other men were enthusiastically playing an electronic tennis game. There was a picture of a rather plump lady, au naturel, over the bar. And there was a jukebox in the corner playing country music.
MASH Goes to Morocco Page 20
