Fort Wayne, Indiana.
Frank leant over Josie to straighten the covers, brushed the colourless hair from her sleeping face and kissed her lightly on the forehead. Crossed the room to Annie's bed, slipped the book from her hand and placed it carefully on the bedside table. Paused in the doorway to read the embroidered text, green on green: "Show me thy ways, O Lord. Teach me thy paths." The only picture on his daughters' bedroom wall. Flicked the light off and shut the door silently behind him.
Across the landing a chink of light showed under Beth's door. Hesitated on the landing a moment, then knocked.
"Bethy?" Turned the door handle and went in. His eldest girl knelt by her bed. Saying her prayers like a good girl. Except that she wasn't. She was looking at something in her hands, glanced up as he entered, startled and slightly guilty.
Frank squatted in front of her, smiled to let her know that Daddy wasn't angry with her. Beth smiled hesitantly back. She was not a pretty child, none of his daughters were. Impossible that they should be, given their inheritance. Louise Bethany Burns had stringy, pale brown hair and a thin-lipped smile, but at least she knew him. Unlike the other girls, who had shied away in fear when this strange, unremembered father had re-entered their lives so unexpectedly. Just as his wife had. Strangely, that hurt him. Frank had never been a good father, nor a good husband. He had sired children because Louise had wanted it, because it was the expected thing, and what a man should do to be a good Christian American. Wondered why, when Bethy was the only person in the house who didn't still look at him as though he needed a straitjacket.
"What's that you've got Bethy?" That guilty look in her eyes again. Wordlessly handed him a crumpled photograph.
It was strange, seeing them there in the photograph together. Majors Burns-and-Houllihan, said just like that in one breath, usually accompanied by a sniggering aside or an insolent roll of the eyes from Trapper John. Frank and Margaret. Two officers in khaki green, brass polished, dog tags gleaming, smiles almost genuine. His arm was about her waist, her silver-blonde hair falling loose to her shoulders, a ragged bunch of pale flowers in one hand. Margaret. His girl. God... He had loved her. Why had it never been enough?
"Who is she?" Beth's tentative question.
"Major Houllihan. We served together... in Korea."
Beth looked at him, her eyes calculating, wondering. Bethy's eyes were blue. Why had he never noticed that before? Blue like Margaret's or Hawkeye's, blue like a Korean summer sky.
"She's beautiful."
"Yes, she is." Wondered where Margaret was now. Whether she was happy living the lie that was Mrs Donald Penobscott.
"I won't tell mother." Bethy's promise. Looked at him with those blue eyes. Damn it all. He didn't care. Even if no one else ever believed him, Frank's Bethy was beautiful too.