"There it is," McCoy said. "Make the next right, Hart."
"You guys have your breakfast?" Sessions asked.
"We stopped in Richmond," McCoy said. "But I could have something. Coffee and a doughnut anyway."
"I called General Pickering after you called me yesterday," Sessions said. "He said we could bring Hart by at eight this morning. But when I called from the lobby, there was no answer. I guess he's still asleep. If it makes you feel any better, Lieutenant Moore, neither one of you should be out of the hospital."
"Yes, Sir."
"So there will be time for me to talk a little to Private Hart, and then we'll go see the General. Give him another hour in bed." An hour later, when Captain Sessions called on the house phone in the lobby of the Foster Lafayette Hotel, there was no answer from Senator Richmond F. Fowler's suite.
"Wait here," Sessions ordered, and then modified that.
"You go sit down, Moore, over there. I'm going to check with the desk and see if he left a message." There was no message at the desk.
"I don't like this," Sessions said to McCoy. "I think we'd better see if we can get somebody to let us into the suite."
Hart said, "I've got a sort of master key for hotel rooms, if you'd like me to try."
"I told you," McCoy said, smiling, "that Hart would be useful."
"Let's see if your key works, Hart," Sessions said.
There was a Do Not Disturb card hanging from the doorknob of the Fowler suite.
"Fowler's in Chicago," Sessions said. "Pickering told me when I called him." Hart pushed the Do Not Disturb card out of the way and applied his "key"-the blade of a pocketknife ground square and flat-to the crack in the door. He then pushed the door open and stood back to let Sessions enter.
In the sitting room were the remnants of Fleming Pickering's room service dinner, including the wheeled cart and an empty quart of scotch.
Sessions, with McCoy on his heels, went quickly to Pickering's bedroom.
When they opened the door, the foul smell of human waste met them.
Fleming Pickering, wearing only a sleeveless undershirt, made a failed attempt to pull a sheet over him.
"My God!" Sessions said.
"I seem to be a little under the weather," Fleming Pickering said weakly.
McCoy went to the bed and made an instant diagnosis: "Malaria," he said.
"You think that's what it is, Ken?" Pickering asked.
"Sweating, freezing? You can't control your bowels"" McCoy asked.
"Yes. Made a hell of a mess, haven't I?"
"We've got to get him out of that bed," Hart said matter-of-factly. "In addition to the mess he's made, it's soaking wet."
"There's at least one more bedroom," Sessions said.
"You two get him on his feet," Hart ordered, "and I'll clean him up.
Then we'll move him."
"Moore," Sessions ordered, "get on the horn and get the house physician up here. And then call the dispensary at Eighth and Eye and have them send an ambulance over here. An ambulance and a doctor."
"The dispensary where?" Moore asked.
"At Marine Barracks. The number will be in the phone book," Sessions said.
"No," Pickering said, as McCoy and Sessions bent over the bed to pick him up. "Moore, don't call the dispensary. Just the house doctor. His name is Selleres. He can take care of me."
"Call the dispensary, Moore," Sessions ordered.
"Goddamn it, Captain," Pickering said furiously. "I said no
"Do what the General says, Moore," Sessions said after a moment's hesitation.
Hart came out of the bathroom with wet towels and wiped the waste from Pickering's groin area and from his legs.
"God, that's disgusting, something like this," Pickering said.
"Don't be silly, General," Hart said. "Women do it to their babies three, four times a day."
"Christ!" Pickering said.
"Where's the other bedroom?" Hart asked.
"Down the corridor somewhere, I suppose," Sessions said.
Then, with Pickering suspended between them, he and McCoy carried Pickering out of the room.
Hart went ahead of them into the other bedroom and had the covers ripped off one of its twin beds before they dragged Pickering in.
"We've got to get some fluid in him," McCoy said. "He's dehydrated."
"Do you know what you're doing, McCoy?" Sessions asked.
"This isn't the first malaria I've seen." They lowered Pickering into the bed. Hart covered him with a blanket.
"A minute ago I was sweating," Pickering said. "Now, goddamn it, I'm freezing!" His body shook with shivering under the blanket. Hart ripped the bedspread and a blanket from the other twin bed and laid it over him.
"Doctor Sellers is on his way," Moore announced from the door.
"Selleres, " Pickering corrected him. His, teeth chattered.