'You can't operate on him until I admit him,' said a clerk.
'You can't admit him until I clear him,' said a fat, gruff colonel with a mustache and an enormous pink face that pressed down very close to Yossarian and radiated scorching heat like the bottom of a huge frying pan. 'Where were you born?' The fat, gruff colonel reminded Yossarian of
the fat, gruff colonel who had interrogated the chaplain and found him guilty. Yossarian stared up at him through a glassy film. The cloying scents of formaldehyde and alcohol sweetened the air.
'On a battlefield,' he answered.
'No, no. In what state were you born?'
'In a state of innocence.'
'No, no, you don't understand.'
'Let me handle him,' urged a hatchet-faced man with sunken acrimonious eyes and a thin, malevolent mouth. 'Are you a smart aleck or something?' he asked Yossarian.
'He's delirious,' one of the doctors said. 'Why don't you let us take him back inside and treat him?'
'Leave him right here if he's delirious. He might say something incriminating.'
'But he's still bleeding profusely. Can't you see? He might even die.'
'Good for him!'
'It would serve the finky bastard right,' said the fat, gruff colonel. 'All right, John, let's speak out. We want to get to the truth.'
'Everyone calls me Yo-Yo.'
'We want you to co-operate with us, Yo-Yo. We're your friends and we want you to trust us. We're here to help you. We're not going to hurt you.'
'Let's jab our thumbs down inside his wound and gouge it,' suggested the hatchet-faced man.
Yossarian let his eyes fall closed and hoped they would think he was unconscious.
'He's fainted,' he heard a doctor say. 'Can't we treat him now before it's too late? He really might die.'
'All right, take him. I hope the bastard does die.'
'You can't treat him until I admit him,' the clerk said.
Yossarian played dead with his eyes shut while the clerk admitted him by shuffling some papers, and then he was rolled away slowly into a stuffy, dark room with searing spotlights overhead in which the cloying smell of formaldehyde and sweet alcohol was even stronger. The pleasant, permeating stink was intoxicating. He smelled ether too and heard glass tinkling. He listened with secret, egotistical mirth to the husky breathing of the two doctors. It delighted him that they thought he was unconscious and did not know he was listening. It all seemed very silly to him until one of the doctors said, 'Well, do you think we should save his life? They might be sore at us if we do.'
'Let's operate,' said the other doctor. 'Let's cut him open and get to the inside of things once and for all. He keeps complaining about his liver. His liver looks pretty small on this X ray.'
'That's his pancreas, you dope. This is his liver.'
'No it isn't. That's his heart. I'll bet you a nickel this is his liver. I'm going to operate and find out. Should I wash my hands first?'
'No operations,' Yossarian said, opening his eyes and trying to sit up.
'Another county heard from,' scoffed one of the doctors indignantly. 'Can't we make him shut up?'
'We could give him a total. The ether's right here.'
'No totals,' said Yossarian.
'Another county heard from,' said a doctor.
'Let's give him a total and knock him out. Then we can do what we want with him.' They gave Yossarian total anesthesia and knocked him out. He woke up thirsty in a private room, drowning in ether fumes. Colonel Korn was there at his bedside, waiting calmly in a chair in his baggy, wool, olive-drab shirt and trousers. A bland, phlegmatic smile hung on his brown face with its heavy-bearded cheeks, and he was buffing the facets of his bald head gently with the palms of both hands. He bent forward chuckling when Yossarian awoke, and assured him in the friendliest tones that the deal they had made was still on if Yossarian didn't die. Yossarian vomited, and Colonel Korn shot to his feet at the first cough and fled in disgust, so it seemed indeed that there was a silver lining to every cloud, Yossarian reflected, as he drifted back into a suffocating daze. A hand with sharp fingers shook him awake roughly. He turned and opened his eyes and saw a strange man with a mean face who curled his lip at him in a spiteful scowl and bragged, 'We've got your pal, buddy. We've got your pal.' Yossarian turned cold and faint and broke into a sweat.