[continued from previous message]   
      
   Bad move. Harlan picked up a huge, black-iron frying pan and hit the   
   Corporal   
   upside the head. His tormentor flew across the floor of the kitchen,   
   leaving   
   a thin trail of blood behind on the floor.   
      
      
   Ellison ran. As he himself put it as he retold this tale, "feets,   
   don't fail   
   me now!" He ran through awful, viscous, stinking, New Jersey mud. He   
   ran   
   through the motor pool, jeeps of MPs circling. He ran up the steps of   
   the   
   Orderly Room, the company commander's office, and straight into the   
   office of   
   the Officer on Duty.   
      
      
   The OD, a Second Lieutenant, looked up calmly at Ellison. Harlan   
   poured out   
   his tale of suffering. When Harlan had finished, the Second Lieutenant   
   said,   
   in a Southern drawl, "I think you're a coward, boy."   
      
      
   Harlan hit him.   
      
   The Second Lieutenant went flying backwards, falling into the   
   collection of   
   quart-sized beer-bottles (called 'ponies' in those days) he kept on   
   his   
   baseboard.   
      
      
   Two huge black sergeants came in a restrained Ellison, pinning him   
   back   
   against the wall. "Cool it, baby," one whispered quietly into his ear.   
      
      
   The Second Lieutenant was up, screaming that Harlan would end his ;²`   
   to the Earth's core to escape.   
      
   Now, the sergeants despised the Second Lieutenant. He was a racist   
   Southerner,   
   and they were black. They didn't want him to have the pleasure of   
   breaking   
   this poor schmuck they had pinned.   
      
      
   One of the sergeants asked Harlan, "have they read you the Uniform   
   Code?"   
   Ellison said that he didn't know what it was, that it hadn't been read   
   to him.   
      
      
      
   This was a good thing. The Uniform Code of Military Justice is   
   required to be   
   read to all new servicemen. Until the code is read, a draftee is still   
   a   
   civilian and not subject to military law.   
      
      
   When the sergeant pointed out that Harlan could not be punished by   
   conventional military means, the Second Lieutenant was furious. The   
   sergeant   
   them suggested that Harlan be transferred out to Fort Benning,   
   Georgia, to   
   undergo Ranger training. The Second Lieutenant agreed, hoping that the   
   rigorous course would break Ellison. Needless to say, it didn't.   
      
      
   After Harlan got out of Ranger training, he went home to New York to   
   visit   
   his wife (during his first marriage). He was looking forward to seeing   
   her,   
   and bought flowers from a sidewalk vendor. He reached his apartment,   
   opened   
   the door - and was shocked to discover a sailor's uniform lying on the   
   livingroom floor.   
      
      
   Harlan came in to the bedroom. He found his wife and the sailor asleep   
   in the   
   bed. He pulled the sailor out of the bed, threw him on the floor, and   
   held   
   him down his his boot on the seaman's chest. He yelled at his wife to   
   get   
   dressed. He threw the naked sailor out of the apartment and told him   
   to go to   
   the basement to collect his uniform. The uniform Harlan threw down the   
   airwell so that it would end up in the basement. He and his wife then   
   had a   
   most heated discussion. Needless to say, that marriage did not last   
   long.   
   What he claimed disturbed him most was not that she was having sex on   
   the sly   
   with another man; but that it wasn't even with a member of his own   
   branch of   
   the Service.   
      
      
   For the sake of brevity, I move on; others can do more justice to   
   Ellison,   
   I'm sure.   
      
      
   -- Harlan Ellison Reading   
      
   Harlan's reading was early Sunday morning. Before he began two men in   
   karate   
   outfits burst upon the stage. They bowed to Harlan, and then presented   
   him   
   with a black belt from a national martial arts organization, encased   
   in black   
   velvet and with his name printed in gold letters on the outside.   
      
      
   Harlan then read his wonderful short story, "Paladin of the Lost   
   Hour." This   
   short story was also an episode of the Twilight Zone, starring Danny   
   Kaye as   
   Gaspar in his last performance. This story touched everyone who heard   
   it   
   deeply, and when it was finished there was not a dry eye left in the   
   room,   
   including Harlan's.   
      
      
   After the story, Susan Ellison < Harlan's wife < entered the lecture   
   hall.   
   "Honey, I cried again," he said. They kissed. Harlan said that she and   
   he   
   will have been married for twelve years this year.[/quote]   
      
   ***   
   (From the archives, original text restored.)   
      
      
   View the attachments for this post at:   
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   This is a response to the post seen at:   
   http://www.jlaforums.com/viewtopic.php?p=658076382#658076382   
      
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