"Where could she possibly be, Major?" Colonel Potter asked Margaret after the OR session was over. In his office later that day, he and Margaret sat down, discussing the strange circumstances in which the nurse had left and what the head nurse talked to her about. "You said that one moment, she was there in the tent, and the next, she was gone. Where did she go? Did you see where? Do you know?"
"No, Sir," Margaret replied, once more angry with the nurse when she thought about the night before. "I tried talking to her last night, but she…no, it was like she did not like authority. She mocked this unit, the wounded and the people who work here with her words, I feel. She agreed and even encouraged to a transfer and I said I could get the papers without her help. Then, she said the most bizarre thing, asking me if I wish if she was dead! I don't understand her, Colonel."
"Do you think she's suicidal then, Major?"
The question hung in the air, but Margaret found that she almost could not answer it. She even most laughed at the idea had it not surprised her. Winifred Curtis, suicidal? It was laughable!
"No," she managed to say, shocked at the question. "It might have been that she was being spiteful and wanted people to see me be vindictive towards her. She wanted to be a martyr, a victim of some sort, and to have some attention from the others. Well, I'm not allowing it. Winifred Curtis is not anything of that sort. She's –"
"Major, I get the point. And I would tend to agree with you, but Lieutenant Curtis is not here to defend herself at all. I only have your word right now. I see no other nurses behind you."
Margaret, aware of that none of her nurses stood behind her (save for Kellye a few times maybe), protested vigorously. "Colonel, you don't understand, nor do you show me that you trust my word. No, listen to me! By talking to her, being friendly to her, I saw her turn right around and denounce me in front of the other nurses. I was insulted and so were the people involved."
"Margaret –"
"No, this isn't a matter of not being friends with any of my nurses or none of them confining in me." Margaret put her hand up in defense. "Colonel, I can handle my nurses perfectly fine. I put this one to your attentions because…because, well, I needed advice. And because she was causing a huge disruption in this hospital unit and I didn't want you thinking that I wasn't doing my job or not disciplining her. I was trying to help her, but she pushed me away."
"Did I hear that the scorpion has left us in this desert?" Hawkeye Pierce, coming into the office with only the barest of his Army uniform on, asked the people before him. He then sat down next to Margaret, blatantly showing off his underclothes and his red robe. "She has quite a sting, all right, and a bite in the back to boot. Ack, even the bravest of all men could not be near that creature of monstrosity."
"Except Sergeant Church," Margaret reminded him.
"Children, children, must we listen to vile gossip?" Colonel Potter asked with a sigh.
"This vile gossip happens to be true," Hawkeye protested. "Colonel, this woman rejected me –"
"Oh, you poor thing," Margaret muttered as an interruption.
"Never fear for me, Margaret, for I always have a back-up plan," Hawkeye reassured her gently, then turning back to the colonel. "Now, Colonel, this woman not only rejected me, but implied that I, the cleanest of all of your bachelor surgeons – the Chiefest of the Chief of them all – have passed everything else, like the creepy-crawlies, from yours truly to every nurse in this camp. She even said that Margaret here has the worst case of all and that I was having an affair with her during her marriage."
"She said what? Oh, Colonel, that little weasel will –"
Colonel Potter stood up. "Margaret, Hawkeye, enough. We have a sufficient amount of problems on our hands, the rumor mill of this camp the least of it. Now, we need to find this nurse and ask what her problem is before thinking of transferring her. Remember, Major, I outrank you and need to put my John Hancock on that paper for approval before she vamooes out of here."
"Yes, of course, Sir," Margaret replied meekly, "but seeing as how I tried talking to her last night, shouldn't somebody else more…I don't know, popular or practical…than I am be the one who will talk with her?"
"Maybe Father Mulcahy can?" Hawkeye suggested seriously.
"No offense, Pierce, I don't think the Padre can handle her by the way everybody says she's acting," Colonel Potter pointed out. "As a matter of fact, I think Father Mulcahy will think her as an act of sacrilege if he listened to her talk."
"Hey, that's my line." Hawkeye's blue eyes sparkled with pride.
"I've been around you too long, Pierce. You rub off on me sometimes."
"Can we can please get back to the situation at hand, namely my missing nurse?" Margaret asked with annoyance in her voice. "Colonel, she's still missing. At this point, we can look for her now or consider her AWOL and/or missing and write up a report."
"I vote for searching for the little wimp," came Charles' voice as he, too, came into the office to listen to the conversation. He moved his hand like a fan, cooling him from the heat, but it seemed futile with too many people already packed into Potter's office.
"Seeing as how she unmanned you without a word of insult in return, Charles, I'd say that was pretty nice of you to say that," BJ added as he came in right behind Charles, also waving his hand as a fan. "That Mess Tent confrontation was pure entertainment. I tell you, it was a perfect show."
"Considering, Hunnicutt, that she clawed at your back one night most…sexually…while you were sleeping and very avidly dreaming about your wife doing that to you, I'd say you better shut your mouth!"
"Really, Charles, do you know how to –?"
"Oh, look, an office party!" Hawkeye chuckled, interrupting his bunkmate.
"Colonel!" Margaret yelled as she looked from one Swampman to the other.
"Ok, lady and germs, we still have a lot of wounded men in Post-Op and a missing, chaotic nurse," Colonel Potter yelled, sighing and thinking about how rowdy this particular crowd was. "I have two to search for her. Do I have any more takers?"
"I'll take a search and spin the wheel for ten," Hawkeye said confidently.
"Margaret?"
Colonel Potter looked at the head nurse, eying her with questions. Granted, she was frustrated enough with one of her nurses missing, but it also made her nervous, he could tell. There was a war around them and the enemy was three miles away from them, three short miles in which Nurse Curtis could have been mistaken for somebody else (like the enemy), taken prisoner or even left for dead…none of which, the colonel reasoned rationally, she deserved, even if she was the scorn of the 4077th.
"Ok, go search for her," the head nurse relented after a minute of everybody looking at her for the final verdict. "But if we don't find her in forty-eight hours, I'd say to write up a report, either MIA or AWOL, depending on what we find."
Colonel Potter nodded. "A good decision, I think. Now, boys and girl, do you think I should call out a party now?"
"Evening would be ideal, when it's cooler, but I don't think the men would like working in the dark with flashlights the enemy nearby," BJ said.
"True, true, but Hunnicutt, it'll be just as hot at night than now," Charles pointed out.
"All good points, but if we take it slowly and take breaks often, the men will be ok," Colonel Potter decided. "Radar, make sure that the first search parties have water, hats and are well-covered in the heat!"
Radar, coming in as Colonel Potter called for him, recited the orders at the same time as the commanding officer before him. Going to carry out the orders, the company of fellow officers snickered and almost laughed at the hilarity of the company clerk still knowing what everybody wanted without asking and reciting it verbatim.
"That's more like it," the colonel said, seeing the smiles, the heat almost forgotten. "Now, head out. I'm sure the men will find something soon."
"I think we already have, Sir," Klinger claimed as he came into the office suddenly, some of a uniform in his hairy hands, his white gloves (matching his light grey gown) in the other hand. "Before Radar could ask us to go out, I found this near the chopper pad. I think it might to do with Lieutenant Curtis' disappearance."
Klinger then handed his CO a jacket – too hot to use it, for sure – with Winifred Curtis' name on the front. Margaret recognized it as Potter turned it around in his hands, showing everybody what was on it. She dimly remembered that the woman had it tied around her waist when she left the nurses' tent the night before. Why, she could not discern.
But what everybody in the office saw on it were flecks of blood on the back of it, some splatters and drops, as if it had lightly sprinkled on the object. When Colonel Potter dared to turn it so everybody could see it, Margaret saw that, on the sleeves, were streaks of it, as if somebody had wiped their hands on it or had wiped up a mess someplace else.
"What are you thinking, Sir?" BJ dared to ask as everybody stared at the jacket, evidence that somebody had obviously done something with it or the nurse had done something to herself.
Or, even more sinister in everybody's mind, was the fact that something might have happened to the nurse in the evilest way. It might be their only explanation to her disappearance.
"I think we might have a wounded or dead nurse on our hands," Colonel Potter replied. "Or I think somebody might have put it there to be found, to tell us something."
"Like Nurse Curtis might have been killed," Margaret agreed, shuddering as she said it.