Chapter IV: Home Sweet Home
The journey passed quickly for Mulcahy, who spent most of it stretched out across the back seat in a state of merciful unconsciousness. When the Jeep finally rolled into camp it was past midnight, and Houlihan had to shake him awake, but he was relieved to find that he felt much better. The headache was a shadow of its former self, a blessing for which he was inexpressibly grateful, and he was confident that after a good night's sleep he would feel almost normal again.
But it looked as though sleep would have to wait. Radar O'Reilly, the 4077th's prescient company clerk, must have sensed their impending arrival without benefit of radio contact; he was waiting outside in his pajamas and robe to greet them when the Jeep shuddered to a halt, a wide grin lighting up his face.
"Major! Father! Geez, it's great to see you guys," Radar babbled excitedly. "What happened to you? We've all been really worried!"
"It's good to see you, too, Radar," said Mulcahy, letting the boy's elation lift his own spirits. Only now, face to face with Radar, was he beginning to realize how close he had come to never seeing any of his friends again. The thought made him shiver despite the warmth of the night air.
Houlihan seemed equally happy to be back among friends. "That's a long, complicated story, Corporal," she chuckled.
Radar cocked his head to one side and frowned, his eyes flicking between the two of them. Ah, yes, what's wrong with this picture, thought Mulcahy with affectionate amusement. Few things of importance slipped past Radar unnoticed.
But the clerk's instincts also must have told him that, for now, it was best not to ask questions. Instead he stretched out a welcoming hand to the Jeep's driver. "Hi, I'm Corporal O'Reilly, company clerk. You can call me Radar, 'cause everybody does."
Travers, smiling, accepted the handshake. "Corporal Travers...Steve. Say, Radar, is there anyplace a guy can get a cup of coffee this time of night? It's a long drive back to my unit."
"Um, sure. But you can bunk here tonight, if you want to. There's an extra cot in one of the enlisted men's tents."
"Sounds fine to me. I'll just get an early start in the morning."
Radar led them all into his office to make the arrangements. The army had at least one form for every occasion, after all, even for billeting overnight guests. Mulcahy dared not imagine the tower of paperwork that might be generated by an unauthorized body swap between a chaplain and a head nurse.
When he had located the correct forms, Radar threw another baffled glance at Mulcahy and Houlihan. "Um, I'll get the corporal settled in, but I think you guys should go talk to Colonel Blake right away. He's probably still over at the Swamp."
Taking pity on the clerk, Mulcahy moved to pat him on the shoulder while offering a discreet whisper of reassurance in his ear. "Don't worry, my son...you're not imagining things."
His suspicions as good as confirmed, Radar's jaw went slack and his eyes grew round behind his glasses as he stared at first Mulcahy, then Houlihan. But with a professionalism belied by his youth, he withheld the questions that must have been burning the tip of his tongue and hunkered down with Travers to fill out the forms.
--o00o--
"What did you say to him?" asked Houlihan as she and Mulcahy began the short walk to the Swamp, the infamous residence of Doctors Pierce, McIntyre, and Burns. The thought of seeing Frank Burns, the man who had so often shared her army-issue cot back when she was 100 percent woman, was making her insides flutter uncomfortably. On the drive back to camp, she had taken some time to consider the Frank issue but had reached no satisfactory conclusions. No matter how gently she broke it to him, the new version of Margaret Houlihan was going to come as an unwelcome surprise. And how ironic was it that just when she felt the greatest need for the warmth and solace of a man's arms, that comfort was to be denied her?
Mulcahy stopped and turned to her, his expression serious. "I only confirmed what Radar already suspected, Major. I hope we weren't planning to try to hide this from our friends, because I don't believe my acting skills are up to the job."
"No, you're right. We can trust the people here to protect us, and we're going to need help to figure out how to undo this." She paused, exhaling a sigh. "Ready?"
He nodded, and they continued on their way.
Lights were still on inside the tent, and Houlihan could hear the conversational hum of voices. With a last "here goes nothing" glance at Mulcahy, she knocked.
A few thumps, a muffled curse, and then Trapper John McIntyre was opening the door. He was bleary-eyed and obviously drunk off his ass, but when he realized who he was gawking at, his face came to life with a gleeful, toothy grin. "Holy shit!" he shouted. "Guys, look who's back!"
McIntyre ushered them into the tent to show them off to Hawkeye Pierce and Henry Blake, who were themselves three or four king-sized sheets to the wind. Frank was notably absent, his bedcovers still unmussed, and Houlihan felt a twinge of worry. It wasn't time for his normal duty shift....where could he be at this hour?
Despite their intoxication, or because of it, the three surgeons bestowed a warm welcome on their returning comrades. Maybe too warm in Mulcahy's case -- Houlihan, as hapless bystander, had to watch him fend off McIntyre's wandering hands and endure a wet kiss on the cheek from Pierce. She cleared her throat loudly to redirect their attention.
"Oh, sorry, Father. Did you want a kiss, too?" Pierce was never one to miss an opportunity for innuendo.
"Aww, lay off, Hawk," slurred Blake, collapsing into the chair behind him. "Have a li'l reshpect, huh?"
"He knows I'm only kidding," Pierce protested. "Right, Father? We're just glad to have you both back in one piece! Speaking of which" -- he frowned and crossed his arms in a mock-parental pose -- "where the hell have you been?"
Blake bestirred himself again, half-rising from his seat before thinking better of it. "Hey, I'm the guy in charge around here. I'll ashk the questions! Uh...where the hell have you been?"
Condensing the story so as not to exceed her audience's diminished attention spans, Houlihan recounted the highlights, but the corker twist she saved for last. "So now that we're back, there's just one little problem."
"What's that?" asked Pierce, who had been listening attentively, not once attempting to interrupt with a wisecrack. More than anything else he could have said or done, that restraint was the clearest sign that his concern for her and Mulcahy was sincere.
Knowing in advance how ridiculous her next words would sound, Houlihan thumped the palm of her hand against her chest and dropped the mortar shell. "The problem is...I'm not Father Mulcahy."
Three pairs of incredulous, bloodshot eyes pinned her where she stood.
"And I am Father Mulcahy," the chaplain added, holding out the silver crucifix for emphasis.
Three pairs of eyes swiveled toward him. Somebody's martini glass dropped and shattered on the floor in the otherwise total silence.
Then McIntyre was on his feet, grinning and wagging an accusatory finger. "Aw, you guys really had us goin' there for a minute...."
But Mulcahy shook his head. "It's not a joke. Appearances to the contrary, I am Francis Mulcahy and that is Margaret Houlihan."
"Oh, come on," snorted Pierce. "The cross was a nice touch, Margaret, but you don't expect us to...."
Houlihan's patience was dwindling. All right, so the situation was hard to believe -- she was the first to admit that -- but they weren't even making an effort. "Look, Pierce, this is serious!" she snapped. "Unlike you juvenile delinquents, I have better things to do with my time than dream up stupid pranks. God damn it -- those Commie bastards did something to us!"
Confused glances were exchanged all around, and Blake mumbled aloud what they all must have been thinking. "He sure soundsh like Margaret...."
Apparently still skeptical, Pierce gestured to Mulcahy. "Okay, then...who do you sound like?"
On cue, Mulcahy began to recite from the Roman Catholic liturgy in rapid and flawless Latin. "Pater noster, qui es in coelis: sanctificetur nomen tuum: adveniat regnum tuum: fiat voluntas tua sicut in coelo et in terra. Panem nostrum quotidianum da nobis hodie: et dimitte nobis debita nostra... Shall I go on?"
"No need," sighed Pierce, his hands held up in a gesture of surrender. "Gentlemen, unless we're experiencing some kind of collective alcohol-soaked hallucination, I think we have a problem."
--o00o--
In consideration of the late hour and the quantity of home-distilled gin that had been consumed by certain individuals, it was decided to postpone further discussion until morning, much to Mulcahy's relief. He'd been looking forward to setting aside the events of this traumatic day, if only in the transitory respite of sleep.
Before bed, however, there was yet another issue to address. Thanks to his stint as one of Captain Dickinson's loading-dock laborers, not to mention his roll in the dirt under a hail of charred fallout, a visit to the showers seemed imperative. But the showers were, of course, communal -- genuine privacy in a MASH unit being near-nonexistent -- and he was finding the prospect of lathering up Houlihan's unclothed body difficult enough to face even leaving out the possibility of witnesses.
As he and the major left the Swamp together, Mulcahy raised the subject as delicately as he could, and she proposed a practical solution: until things were straightened out, they would have to make themselves available to each other for "guard duty."
Understanding achieved, she accompanied him to his tent, where he discovered that his bathrobe didn't fit quite as well as it used to, and then to the showers. Fortunately, they weren't in high demand at one in the morning, and it was no trouble to commandeer them for ten minutes or so.
While Houlihan stood watch outside the door, Mulcahy spent perhaps the most conflicted ten minutes of his life soaping up and rinsing off her unfamiliar feminine contours. No matter how hard he tried to distract himself with innocuous thoughts, there was just no getting around the fact that he was touching a woman's body...or the fact that it was shockingly arousing. Indeed, it took every last shred of self-control he possessed not to linger over those areas that seemed to beg for more thorough exploration.
It wasn't that he didn't understand the temptation to explore further. Quite the contrary; since taking his vow of celibacy he had come to understand human sexual urges all too well. But this went a step beyond the sort of temptation he was accustomed to resisting -- the illicit thrill of touching another person and the physical experience of that same touch commingled in a teasing, tantalizing feedback loop.
With a little sigh that was half a sob, he tugged sharply on the shower chain and doused himself in a spray of icy water.
--o00o--
When the chaplain emerged from the showers, shivering and unwilling to look her in the eye, Houlihan could tell something was troubling him, and it didn't take a doctorate in psychology to guess what that might be. She wondered how long it had been since he'd had such intimate contact with the opposite sex...if he ever had. But to spare both of them further awkwardness, she didn't pursue the issue, despite a natural curiosity about what her body might have gotten up to without her.
Since Houlihan chose to postpone her own shower until morning, they parted ways after arranging an 0830 assignation to exchange clothing (it being a sure bet that nothing she owned would fit her properly anymore), and she walked to her tent lost in thought. About herself, about Francis Mulcahy, about the whole surrealistic waking nightmare. Disquieting thoughts that she hadn't had time to consider earlier, when she was dealing with the more immediate problem of getting back to camp.
She let the tent door close behind her and leaned back against the frame. In spite of everything, after the ordeal she'd been through it was a wonderful feeling to be home and safe. As safe as a person could be in a war zone three miles from the front, anyway.
Reaching over to turn on the light, Houlihan suddenly noticed that she wasn't alone. But her automatic fear response was drowned under a wave of affection when she recognized Frank Burns curled up in her bunk, sound asleep. The poor man must have been so worried about her, to seek refuge among her belongings. Well...either that or he'd taken advantage of her empty quarters as a good place to hide out from his tentmates. Though the streak of fondness she had for Frank was genuine, it had never completely blinded her to his shortcomings.
From past experience, she knew it would be best to let him sleep and save the revelations for morning. Of course, that left her out in the cold as far as sleeping arrangements went, since she couldn't very well get into bed with her lover -- it would be somewhat counterproductive for him to wake up in the arms of "Father Mulcahy." So, exhausted and without options, she headed back to the Swamp to make use of Frank's abandoned cot.