ripped somebody off-or assisted in the ripping-off- and then fled Tongduchon?
Maybe.
The next possible motive was her disgust with the court-martial of the two GIs who’d run down Chon Un-suk. The fact that they’d been tried by American military judges-and not a Korean judge- had enraged the Korean public. But what had enraged Jill most was that, as the first MP on the scene, she’d never been called as a witness and that the two perps had been let off so easily.
Ernie and I resolved to check into the trial more thoroughly.
The final motive was that, according to Madame Chon, Jill had actively participated in the demonstrations held outside the main gate of Camp Casey. That, in itself, was a violation of 8th Army regulations and-I wasn’t sure-might even be a court-martial offense. Had Corporal Jill Matthewson’s politics become so radicalized that she’d decided she’d had enough of the U.S. Army?
By the time I laid all this out for Ernie, he’d finished his noodles, drank down the remaining broth directly from the bowl, and ordered another cup of barley tea from the poker-faced teenage waitress.
“So we have a lot of possible motives for going AWOL,” Ernie said. “All of them might be true; none of them might be true. We don’t know. But what we do know is that if Jill Matthewson is still alive, somebody had to facilitate her escape.”
I whistled softly.
“What?” Ernie asked.
“ ‘Facilitate?’ ”
Ernie grabbed his crotch. “Here. Facilitate this.”
“Okay. I’m just impressed by your vocabulary. Go ahead.”
“Where was I?” Ernie gulped down the last of his barley tea and slammed the bottom of the cup on the rickety wooden table. “Oh yeah. So if somebody facilitated Corporal Matthewson’s unofficial resignation from the Second Infantry Division, they would have had to help her find a place to stay, a source of income, and maybe even a way to avoid the scrutiny of the Korean National Police.”
“That’s a lot to provide,” I said. “A tall, good-looking, Caucasian woman in Korea would be sort of conspicuous.”
“ ‘Conspicuous?’”
“Okay, Ernie. Can it. So what you’re saying is instead of fretting about motives, what we should be working on is who helped her leave, who’s providing her income, who is offering her a safe place to hide.”
“By Jove, I think he’s got it.”
I finished the last of my noodles and the waitress came by and poured us both more barley tea from a large brass urn.
“If I were an American female MP,” I said, “and I wanted to leave the Division, and I knew I needed Korean help, who would I talk to?”
“The people you’d been talking to,” Ernie replied. “Your friends.”
“In this case, the stripper Kim Yong-ai. But she didn’t have much in the way of money.”
“No,” Ernie said, “but she knew how to make it.”
I looked up at Ernie. “You think Jill could be working the Korean nightclub scene?”
“Or something like it,” Ernie said. “An American chick as good-looking as her could make a fortune from Korean businessmen. We need to talk to that Kimchee Entertainment guy again.”
“Pak Tong-i,” I said.
“Right. Maybe he was lying to us. Maybe he knew where they were going. But even if he didn’t lie, he has contacts in the entertainment world. He can provide leads.”
Pulling out wrinkled Korean won notes, I paid the old woman behind the stand for our noodles. Thinking I wasn’t looking, Ernie pulled a couple of dollars worth of MPC, military payment certificates, out of his pocket and palmed them to the young, poker-faced girl who’d waited on us.
I’m not sure but I think she cracked a smile.
The front door to Kimchee Entertainment was padlocked from the outside. Ernie pounded on the door anyway just to make sure, but there was no answer.
“Show-business people don’t keep regular hours,” I said. “We’ll try back later.”
We returned to the spot where we’d left the jeep. Ernie unlocked the chain wrapped around the steering wheel, fired up the engine, and drove us back to Camp Casey. After a thorough identification check at the main gate-and the usual inspection of the back of the vehicle for contraband-we were allowed to pass. Immediately after we rolled away, the MP headed back to the guard shack and switched on his two-way radio.
“They’re keeping tabs on us,” Ernie said.
“Night and day,” I replied.
We cruised through Camp Casey. GIs everywhere. Some marching in military formation, some walking together in small groups. Tanks and self-propelled guns and two-and-a-half-ton trucks and resupply vehicles of all descriptions rumbled past us, everyone moving on compound at a safe, sane fifteen miles per hour. MP jeeps lurked behind hedges, making sure everyone kept within the posted speed limit.
“No little girls are going to be run over here,” Ernie said.
“Yeah,” I agreed. “Except there are no little girls here.”
The 2nd Infantry Division JAG Office was located deep inside the environs of Camp Casey, facing the enormous quadrangle of the Division parade ground. On the opposite side of the field, the three flags of the United States, the Republic of Korea, and the United Nations loomed above the Division Headquarters building. A lifer NCO had once advised me, “Keep a low profile and stay away from the flagpole.” Ernie and I weren’t following either dictum. Not because we wanted to, but because we had no choice.
Second ID JAG was the usual cluster of single-story Quonset huts painted puke green. Instead of a huge statue of an MP outside, they sported a simple whitewashed wooden sign with
black stenciling: OFFICE OF THE 2ND INFANTRY DIVISION JUDGE ADVOCATE GENERAL.
Ernie and I walked inside. Our shoes sunk into plush carpet. Behind a low mahogany counter, an attractive Korean secretary smiled up at us.
“Can I help you?” she asked, in expertly pronounced English.
We showed our badges and I explained that I wanted to talk to the legal officer who had worked on the recent case involving the death of Chon Un-suk. The young woman’s smile flickered. It wasn’t much, just a cloud fleeing across the sky on a sunny day, but it told me much. Koreans knew about the case. All Koreans.
Motioning with her open palm, she said, “Please have a seat.” Then she hustled off into the quiet back corridors of the connected Quonset huts.
Ernie and I sat on cushiony leather. A painting hung from the wall. Traditional Yi Dynasty silk screen: Siberian tiger rampant. But more than rampant. Somehow the artist managed to make the tiger’s eyes look not only human, but crazed.
“Nice digs,” Ernie said.
“You should’ve gone to college,” I told him, “then law school. You wouldn’t have to be traipsing around the ville all day.”
Ernie smiled. “I’d have a good-looking secretary like that one.”
“Yeah.”
“And an air-conditioned office, heated in the winter, cooled in the summer.”
“Of course.”
Ernie thought about it. Finally, he seemed to come to a decision. “Nah. Wouldn’t work.”
“Why not?”
“I’d get my secretary pregnant and punch the presiding judge on the Chon Un-suk court-martial right in the nose.”
“You probably would.” I shook my head. “All that schooling gone to waste.”
“Exactly.”
A few minutes later the secretary returned and beckoned for us to follow. She ushered us down the long corridor, past well-appointed offices with military officers behind teak desks and their Korean civilian assistants in dark suits and ties. We turned right and then left and at the end of the hallway, we were ushered into the office of Lieutenant Colonel Wilbur M. Proffert. The secretary hurried out of the office as Ernie and I saluted the man.
