Yossarian laughed and turned her arms loose. “Let’s have a little more religious freedom between us,” he proposed obligingly. “You don’t believe in the God you want to, and I won’t believe in the God I want to. Is that a deal?”
That was the most illogical Thanksgiving he could ever remember spending, and his thoughts returned wishfully to his halcyon fourteen-day quarantine in the hospital the year before; but even that idyll had ended on a tragic note: he was still in good health when the quarantine period was over, and they told him again that he had to get out and go to war. Yossarian sat up in bed when he heard the bad news and shouted,
“I see everything twice!”
Pandemonium broke loose in the ward again. The specialists came running up from all directions and ringed him in a circle of scrutiny so confining that he could feel the humid breath from their various noses blowing uncomfortably upon the different sectors of his body. They went snooping into his eyes and ears with tiny beams of light, assaulted his legs and feet with rubber hammers and vibrating forks, drew blood from his veins, held anything handy up for him to see on the periphery of his vision.
The leader of this team of doctors was a dignified, solicitous gentleman who held one finger up directly in front of Yossarian and demanded, “How many fingers do you see?”
“Two,” said Yossarian.
“How many fingers do you see now?” asked the doctor, holding up two.
“Two,” said Yossarian.
“And how many now?” asked the doctor, holding up none.
“Two,” said Yossarian.
The doctor’s face wreathed with a smile. “By Jove, he’s right,” he declared jubilantly. “He does see everything twice.”
They rolled Yossarian away on a stretcher into the room with the other soldier who saw everything twice and quarantined everyone else in the ward for another fourteen days.
“I see everything twice!” the soldier who saw everything twice shouted when they rolled Yossarian in.
“I see everything twice!” Yossarian shouted back at him just as loudly, with a secret wink.
“The walls! The walls!” the other soldier cried. “Move back the walls!”
“The walls! The walls!” Yossarian cried. “Move back the walls!”
One of the doctors pretended to shove the wall back. “Is that far enough?”
The soldier who saw everything twice nodded weakly and sank back on his bed. Yossarian nodded weakly too, eyeing his talented roommate with great humility and admiration. He knew he was in the presence of a master. His talented roommate was obviously a person to be studied and emulated. During the night, his talented roommate died, and Yossarian decided that he had followed him far enough.
“I see everything once!” he cried quickly.
A new group of specialists came pounding up to his bedside with their instruments to find out if it was true.
“How many fingers do you see?” asked the leader, holding up one.
“One.”
The doctor held up two fingers. “How many fingers do you see now?”
“One.”
The doctor held up ten fingers. “And how many now?”
“One.”
The doctor turned to the other doctors with amazement. “He does see everything once!” he exclaimed. “We made him all better.”
“And just in time, too,” announced the doctor with whom Yossarian next found himself alone, a tall, torpedo-shaped congenial man with an unshaven growth of brown beard and a pack of cigarettes in his shirt pocket that he chain-smoked insouciantly as he leaned against the wall. “There are some relatives here to see you. Oh, don’t worry,” he added with a laugh. “Not your relatives. It’s the mother, father and brother of that chap who died. They’ve traveled all the way from New York to see a dying soldier, and you’re the handiest one we’ve got.”
“What are you talking about?” Yossarian asked suspiciously. “I’m not dying.”
“Of course you’re dying. We’re all dying. Where the devil else do you think you’re heading?”
“They didn’t come to see me,” Yossarian objected. “They came to see their son.”
“They’ll have to take what they can get. As far as we’re concerned, one dying boy is just as good as any other, or just as bad. To a scientist, all dying boys are equal. I have a proposition for you. You let them come in and look you over for a few minutes and I won’t tell anyone you’ve been lying about your liver symptoms.”
Yossarian drew back from him farther. “You know about that?”
“Of course I do. Give us some credit.” The doctor chuckled amiably and lit another cigarette. “How do you expect anyone to believe you have a liver condition if you keep squeezing the nurses’ tits every time you get a chance? You’re going to have to give up sex if you want to convince people you’ve got an ailing liver.”