Chapter 14

I guess my ‘partner’ was as susceptible to a beautiful woman as the rest of us. I did not see them for 2 days.

When Marcel or ‘Mark’ showed up on Monday for a review he looked like he was dragged in by the proverbial cat.

“Morning Marcel, how did the other guy look?”

“What do you mean, Mon Ami?”

Maybe I should explain. He wore the same clothes he had on Friday, his eyes were red, he was bearded and had that distinct ‘scent’ to him.”

“So did you find out where she wanted the wedding to be and if Michelle and I needed to find you a toaster or a coffee maker for that ‘Camel dung’ they sell here as coffee?”

“Is this how it was with Michelle? My God, that woman must be scared she will be an ‘Old Maid” soon. We met when she was 23 and joined J SOC. Never had the pleasure of her company before Friday and now, I don’t think I want to be without her. What should I do?”

“Maybe shoot her or marry her, I don’t think your buddy Pete would mind, he may even want to ‘join’ you two; too. Tutu, get it?”

“Your funny! Didn’t they teach you ‘don’t ask, don’t tell in the FFL?”

“So, you guys find a ring and set the date yet?”

“Don’t we have a review this morning?”

“There’s this little shop ... Speak of the Devil. You made it Sheila, any trouble?”

“Busy, busy, busy. I booked a room here. Hello Mark! You left this” and she handed him his pen. “I got a call this morning after you left Mark. They heard from some people who asked for a liaison Officer for you. In reality, my boss wanted to see if you could get him a few more things, your people hinted that if they were happy he would be happy. Pete went back and I drew the ‘short straw I guess. Now I’m stuck here in Paris and you are stuck with me. I think I need to ‘find’ a place to stay, perhaps later we could discuss some possibilities?” She gave him a puppy dog look and for the first time I saw Marcel with his mouth open and a blank look on his face.

Jim, Inga, Michelle and Ian strolled in to the Suite, coffee, croissants and more coffee in hand. Michelle gave me a kiss, Inga followed.”

“Inga do you need a place in Paris to stay. Sheila and Marcel are going to examine the possibilities, you could stay with Michelle and I, maybe.”

That did not get me the smack from Michelle I thought it would.

“Michelle said something like that this morning when we got you some coffee. Has she spoken to you already?”

She and Michelle exchanged looks.

“You don’t happen to have a sister or a cousin named Kimber, do you Inga?”

I let it pass, Michelle’s face was getting that blush of red colour.

We had that review. We had that review for almost 16 hours a day for the next 10 days. As we were taught, we built scenarios. If we had 1,000 actors we could have built a war game. As it was 4 scenarios were deemed to be the ‘most probable’ to occur. The trouble was, actually several troubles involved two major things. Money and that in one scenario, the OPFOR did not do what they were supposed to. That raised the obvious question I for one did not want to hear.

‘What was our plan for that 4th scenario?’

“Easy answer. NADA! We are royally screwed if they do not cooperate.”

“Besides, Marcel does not have the money for more than one plan.”

“Blame me!”

“Hey, I just follow orders Mein Herr!”

That made us all feel the last 10 days had been wasted.

Michelle asked an open question. ‘Which plan did the J SOC people think would work?’

“Sheila, could you see if we could conference them, maybe have a review and get their opinion. This gets more complicated by the minute.”

We would have our conference with J SOC in three days.