Retreat, Hell! Part 65

"With which you can settle your Ship's Store bill. Which brings that up. When was the last time you were paid?"

"I guess four months ago, something like that."

McGrory made a note on a lined pad.

"When you move up to Category Two, they'll give you a partial pay," he went on. "It will take some time before your records catch up with you."

"What other great privileges go with Category Two?"

"You have freedom of the building, which means that you can go to the Ship's Store, and the movies-"

"Whoopee!"

"-and the Officers' Club for your meals, if you so desire, and where, I understand, intoxicants of various types are on sale."

"You trust the loonies with booze, do you?"

"Until they demonstrate they can't be trusted with it," McGrory said. "The uniform for Category Two patients is the bathrobe and pajamas. That's so we can easily recognize them if they give in to temptation and walk out the door. Then they're brought back and it's Category One all over again."

"Fascinating! And Category Three?"

"When you work your way up to Category Three, you are permitted pa.s.ses. That means you can go, in uniform, on little tours of the local area we organize. Free bus service, of course. And, sometimes, when accompanied by a responsible family member or friend-have you got a girlfriend?"

"Not anymore."

"Pity. What happened?"

"None of your G.o.dd.a.m.n business, Doctor."

"Well, in Category Three, if you had-or get-a girlfriend, and we thought she was responsible, you could get a six-hour, sometimes an all-day, pa.s.s with her."

"No girlfriend."

"As I said, a pity."

"Is there a Category Four?"

"No. If we don't think you're going to hurt yourself or someone else, there's no sense in keeping you here."

"Why don't we just start with that? I'm not going to hurt myself or anyone else. I'm probably at least as sane as you are. So why do we have to play this game?"

"It's policy."

"f.u.c.k your policy."

"You're fond of that phrase, aren't you? That's what you told the doctor on the med-evacuation flight."

"It's a useful phrase."

"Any questions, Major?"

"How do I get out of this chickens.h.i.t outfit?"

McGrory laughed.

"By working your way up through Category Three. That means we're going to have to talk."

"About . . . what was it you said, my 'ordeal'?"

"Uh-huh."

"Don't hold your breath, Doctor."

"I hadn't intended to," McGrory said. "Well, that's it. You can go back to your room and fill out your Ship's Store list. And call your mother. If she wants to come see you, that can be arranged. The nurse'll explain the rules, visiting hours, et cetera. I'll see you later."

"I don't have any choice there, do I?"

"No. Afraid not. For what it's worth, Major: You can make this as easy or hard as you want. Your choice."

Pick stood up, looked at Dr. McGrory for a moment, and then started out of the office.

His right foot came out of the slipper. He looked down, then kicked off the left slipper and walked down the corridor barefoot.

[FOUR].

THE RACE TRACK SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA 1230 28 OCTOBER 1950.

Brigadier General Fleming Pickering, USMCR, jumped nimbly to the ground from the rear door of the Beaver, exchanged salutes with Lieutenant Colonel D. J. Vandenburg, USA, and then looked back at the airplane. Major Kenneth R. McCoy, USMCR, was climbing down from the copilot's seat.

McCoy could not conceal that stretching his leg to get his foot onto the step mounted on the landing gear strut was painful, or that it hurt like h.e.l.l when he jumped the rest of the way to the ground.

Pickering glanced at Vandenburg and saw on his face that he had seen the same thing he had.

McCoy saluted Vandenburg crisply and smiled.

"I see the colonel has appropriated my vehicle," he said, gesturing toward the Russian jeep.

"I didn't expect to see you back so soon," Vandenburg said.

"He says he's fine," Pickering said. "I have very serious doubts about that."

"I'm all right, sir," McCoy said.

"In a pig's a.s.s, you are," Vandenburg said.

Major Alex Donald, who had flown to Pusan to pick up Pickering and McCoy, finished shutting down the airplane and climbed down from the c.o.c.kpit.

He saluted Vandenburg and said, "Every time I come in here in the Beaver, I devoutly hope there is truth in that crack that the best place to hide something is in plain sight."

"I'm told General Walker remains convinced his missing airplane is somewhere in Korea," Vandenburg said. "The last I heard, he was looking around Pusan." He paused and then looked at Pickering. "We're going to have to talk about that, sir. The Beaver is a.s.signed to the Presidential Mission, and General Howe-"

"Let's talk about it at lunch," Pickering said. "Is there going to be any trouble about the airplane while it's here?"

Vandenburg pointed toward the base operations shack. Coming toward them from it were Technical Sergeant J. M. Jennings, USMC, and two other Marines, all armed with Thompson submachine guns.

"I thought a perimeter guard might be in order," Vandenburg said matter-of-factly.

Jennings saluted.

"You all right, Major?" he asked. "We heard you got-"

"I'm fine, Jennings, thank you," McCoy said.

"You may have to carry him to the Russian jeep, Sergeant," Pickering said. "But aside from that-"

McCoy trotted to the Russian jeep, jumped nimbly into the backseat, and called, "Anytime the general is ready, sir!"

Pickering turned his back to him and said to Vandenburg and Jennings, "That obviously hurt him. Let's act as if we don't think so. But one of the things I intended to tell you, Colonel, is that under no circ.u.mstances is he to go forward of our lines."

"I understand, sir."

"And if you or any of your men hear that he's planning to do something like that, Sergeant, you are to tell Colonel Vandenburg."

Jennings nodded. "Aye, aye, sir."

"Let's go get some lunch," Pickering said, and started toward the jeep.

Major General Ralph Howe, NGUS, was sitting at the dining room table in The House, drinking coffee with Master Sergeant Charley Rogers. The table was set for lunch.

"I'm surprised to see you, McCoy," Howe said. "General Almond told me you took a pretty good hit."

"A little piece of shrapnel, sir," McCoy replied. "I'm all right."

"That is not exactly the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but," Pickering said as he shook hands with Howe. "Major McCoy is on limited duty. You do understand that, don't you, Major McCoy? Limited?"

"Yes, sir."

"Okay. Then let's have some lunch and decide where we go from here."

Master Sergeant Charley Rogers stood up and went through the swinging door into the kitchen. A moment later, two Korean women came through it carrying china tureens. Rogers followed them into the room.

"Fish chowder and chicken and dumplings," he said. "If it tastes as good as it smells, we're in luck."

"So far as I'm concerned in your where-we-go-from-here scenario, Fleming," General Howe said, "Charley and I are on the 1700 courier flight to Tokyo, where I will make my manners to General MacArthur, and then get on a plane-a Trans-Global flight, you should be pleased to learn-for the States."

"You're really determined to leave me all alone here, are you?"

"There are a lot of things I have to say to the President that I don't want to put on paper," Howe said. "After I tell him what I think he should hear, and he wants me to come back over here, I will."

Pickering nodded.

"I think the first thing on this agenda," Howe said as he smiled thanks for the fish chowder being ladled into his bowl, "should be Colonel Van's new status, with which he's not entirely delighted. I wanted to make sure he understands that while I'm sure you're delighted to have him, his transfer to the CIA-you-was my idea, not yours."

"I have to tell you, Colonel," Pickering said, "that it makes sense to me, and I feel a little foolish for not having thought of it myself."

Vandenburg didn't say anything, but it was clear that he had made the decision not to say what he was thinking.

"Let's get it out in the open, Colonel," Pickering said. "What's on your mind?"

Vandenburg met Pickering's eyes, then shrugged.

"General, in War Two, when I was asked to join the OSS, I decided I could be of more use where I was, in counterintelligence. I never regretted that decision to stay in the Army. Especially after the war, when the OSS was disbanded and my friends who had gone into the OSS- I'm talking about career officers-went back to the Army. They were treated like lepers, sir."

McCoy snorted. "Lepers with a social disease?" he asked. " 'Where were you when we were fighting the war?' "

"Exactly." Vandenburg looked at Pickering and then went on: "Ken told me just about the same thing happened to him when he went back to the Marine Corps."

"I didn't realize until right now that it was that bad, Ken," Pickering said, and then remembered: "Weren't you offered a chance to go into the CIA?"

McCoy nodded.

"Why didn't you?"

"I was a Marine," McCoy said. "I know what the colonel's talking about. He's a soldier."

"The same thing happened to me, in 1948, in Greece," Vandenburg went on. "They really wanted me in the CIA there, and I really didn't want to go. And I didn't. And now, all of a sudden, I'm told I'm now in the CIA. This time n.o.body asked me."

"Okay, I'm the villain," Howe said. "But don't mistake that for an apology, Colonel. It was my judgment that unless we got you out of the Army, you were about to be coopted by General Willoughby, and I decided you were too valuable an a.s.set for General Pickering to lose."

"General, I wasn't looking for an apology," Vandenburg said. "I'm a soldier-I go where I'm sent. But General Pickering asked what was on my mind."

"And I'm glad you told me," Howe said. "The President's going to hear about this."

"General, I wish you wouldn't do that. I'm not whining, " Vandenburg said.

"I didn't think you were, Colonel," Howe said. "But my job is to tell the President what I think he would be interested in hearing. And that's what I'm going to do."

"Ken," Pickering asked, "did the same sort of thing happen to Ed Banning when the OSS was disestablished?"

"Sir, Colonel Banning was a regular before the war. He's a Citadel graduate. You know what a fine Marine he is. He was never given command of a battalion, much less a regiment, and he was never promoted above colonel. For that matter, they never used him as an intelligence officer."

"Then why did he stay in the Marine Corps?" Pickering blurted. "G.o.d knows, he doesn't need the money."

"He's a Marine, General," McCoy said. "He knows it, even if there are a lot of b.a.s.t.a.r.ds in the Corps who don't want to acknowledge it."

"That's the end of my contribution to this," General Howe said. "But I'm going to stick around so that I'll be able to tell the President what the new broom is sweeping, and where."

"I'd like to know what you two," Pickering said, pointing at Vandenburg and McCoy, "think the priorities are. You first, McCoy."