and then Mr. Huang drove us south across the Han River. Once we left Seoul, we continued south down the Seoul- Pusan Expressway. Ernie and I were both too stubborn to ask questions. If the First Sergeant wanted to push us around and not tell us what was going on, so be it. We were soldiers. We followed orders. To the letter if we had to. The First Sergeant sat in front with his shoulders back, staring straight ahead. For the entire thirty-minute drive we were quiet, all of us, admiring the brown rice paddies that stretched toward gently rolling hills.
Finally, when we pulled up in front of Tango, this huge bomb shelter that is 8th Army Headquarters (Rear), Ernie couldn’t stand the silent treatment any more. He spoke up and asked what this was all about.
The First Sergeant cleared his throat. “Go with the MPs,” he said. “Somebody wants to talk to you.”
“Who? The CG?”
“Just answer the questions straight, Bascom. Don’t offer any information that isn’t requested. If you don’t know the answer to something, say you don’t know. Don’t try to bullshit the man. And, most importantly, no mouthing off.”
An MP swung open the rear door. When Ernie hesitated, the MP leaned in and grabbed him by the arm.
“Keep your hands off!” he shouted. “I’m coming.”
With that, Ernie climbed out. So did I. The MPs fell in on either side of us, and without a verbal command, we all marched toward the huge looming doors of Tango, 8th Army Headquarters (Rear).
Mr. Huang shoved the sedan in gear, performed a wide, slow U-turn, and he and the First Sergeant drove off toward the expressway leading back to Seoul.
Neither one of them waved.
Our little detail walked down one of Tango’s endless carpeted hallways. There was dim fluorescent lighting, portable walls, and a feeling of cold immensity above. And no doubt that we were in the hollowed-out center of a mountain. The MPs stopped at the end of the hallway, and one of them knocked on a double door made of paneled wood. In the center hung the red-and-white four-leaf-clover patch of the 8th United States Army.
Ernie and I and the small squad of MPs stood for what seemed a long time. Finally, from within, a hollow voice shouted, “Enter!” The MP saluted and he and his fellow MPs stepped back, forming a single file in the center of the hallway. As one, they performed an about face and marched back down the corridor.
Ernie and I glanced at one another. “I’ve had plenty of ass-chewings before,” Ernie whispered, “but no one’s ever gone to this much trouble.” Then he stepped past me and pushed through the door into the room.
7
I followed, frightened at first by the darkness.
When my mother lay dying, when I was a child barely able to talk, her room had been dark like this. Women stood by, lace mantillas covering their heads, and a priest hovered near her bed. They brought me forward. My mother’s face, which had once been smiling and vibrant, appeared wan in the flickering candlelight. She grabbed my hand. Her fingers were cold. So cold I pulled away. But she beckoned and I stepped forward and grabbed her hand in both of mine. Her fingers, and then her palm, became warm again and she smiled at me, a smile as radiant as the wings of a flight of angels.
Suddenly I was back in Tango, shoving such thoughts out of my mind, forcing my concentration back to my immediate surroundings. I’m an adult now. A soldier. A CID investigator. Time to do my job. And accept my ass- chewing if that is what I was here for.
There was a box with a handle on a desk. It was metal, larger than a construction worker’s lunch box, and sticking out of the top was a six-inch-wide bulb. It lit up the desktop but nothing else. The rest of the room was dark. Still, there was enough light to see the man who sat behind the desk. He was thin to the point of emaciation, his receding gray hairline cut so close to the scalp you couldn’t be sure where his forehead ended and the top of his skull began. He wore highly starched fatigues with a razor sharp crease running from the top of the shoulder down to the wrist. On his pressed collar were four black stars. His name tag said ARM-BREWSTER.
Ernie and I both knew who he was, as did every American GI in country. General Frederick K. Armbrewster, Commanding General of the United Nations Command, U.S. Forces Korea, and the 8th United States Army.
Bony fingers shuffled through stacks of paperwork. Much of the paper had already been placed in a box labeled “Out.” More was stacked on the other side of the desk, next to a box labeled “In.”
“Bullshit,” General Armbrewster said. His voice sounded dry. Crackling. As if he needed desperately to gulp down a glass of water. “That’s what it is,” he continued. “All paperwork is bullshit. Designed by the politicians and lawyers to keep themselves rich.”
Then he looked up at us, his mouth set in a straight line.
Ernie and I saluted, both feeling awkward, what with our unshaven faces and grimy clothes. General Armbrewster didn’t seem to notice. Listlessly, he returned our salute and told us to sit on two folding metal chairs in front of his desk.
He didn’t bother to explain the lighting, or why he had to work with a battery-powered lamp on his desk. This was a man who didn’t bother with trifles.
He continued to finish up the paperwork in front of him, hardly noticing us. But he hadn’t made Ernie and me remain at attention while he worked. That seemed out of character. Usually, when we received ass-chewings-and Ernie and I were experts on them-the person doing the chewing took every opportunity to humiliate us; to keep us standing at attention while they leisurely finished their task. That was standard procedure. In the army, humiliating subordinates is what lifers live for. General Armbrewster was different. He hadn’t brought us here to chew us out. Such minute disciplinary detail would be beneath his dignity. He’d brought us here for another reason. Something that had to be done face to face.
Suddenly, I was nervous. Much more nervous than I had been before.
The General finished with the paperwork, slipped a metal clip on a short stack, and tossed it into the “Out” basket. Then he stared at us, each in turn, long and steady.
“First,” he said, “forget all the bullshit.”
I sat with my back ramrod straight in the chair.
He turned his attention fully to me. “They’re going to bring a Report of Survey down on you, Sueno, for losing your forty-five. A Report of Survey that could lead to court-martial.” He stared at me for a few moments. I stared back. He turned toward Ernie. “And an official reprimand against you, Bascom, for being the senior man and allowing it to happen.”
He waited for a reaction, but Ernie and I were still too stunned at being in the presence of a four-star general to say anything. Ernie shows no reverence for anyone alive. And I’ve seen him mouth off in circumstances that were bound to get him slapped in the stockade or even killed, but he chose to mouth off anyway. Threats don’t scare him. Yet even he knew that now was not the time to say anything. A private audience with the Commanding General of 8th Army was not something two lowly CID agents experienced every day. It was as if we’d suddenly been shoved in a cage with a Bengal tiger.
“I believe in redemption,” General Armbrewster declared. “We all make mistakes. The test of a man is whether or not he corrects them.”
He paused and seemed to want a response to this. Was he saying that neither Ernie nor I would be punished if we caught the people who stole my. 45 and shot Han Ok-hi? I think he was. However, I was afraid to say so out loud. Negotiating with a four-star general was not something I was used to. The silence grew longer. Finally, I found the courage to speak. “Yes, sir,” I said. Nothing more.
Armbrewster nodded his bony head, taking my statement as complete acquiescence. Which, of course, it was.
“On the other hand, if one doesn’t correct one’s mistakes…”
The General let the sentence trail off, spreading both his hands, as if allowing sand to sift through his fingers.
His meaning was clear. If Ernie and I don’t catch the people who perpetrated these crimes, he’d allow all charges to be brought against us. The full force and power of the Uniform Code of Military Justice would hammer us senseless.
These weren’t idle threats. In the military justice system, the commanding officer performs the same function
