Martin Limon: G. I. Bones

“That’s our lady,” Ernie said.

I looked up from the SIR. “You’re just choosing her because she’s the best looking you’ve seen so far.”

“You’ve discovered my criterion. Are you a detective or something?”

Ernie started the engine and was just shifting into first gear when, in the distance, we heard a siren. The sound grew louder. Within seconds a canvas-sided MP jeep with a flashing red light atop its roof swerved into the commissary parking lot, hesitated for a moment, and then headed straight toward us.

“What the-” Ernie said.

Tires screeched and the jeep pulled up in front of us, blocking our way. Two armed MPs jumped out. Each kept his right hand atop the grip of his. 45.

Ernie shouted at them. “You’re blocking my way, morons!”

“Tough shit, Bascom,” one of the MPs said. He was a buck sergeant and his name tag said Pollard. I knew him. He was a good MP.

Sergeant Pollard stood in front of Ernie and told him, “You’re off the black-market detail.”

“So what took you so long?” Ernie replied.

“Break-in,” Pollard said. “Field grade officer’s quarters. You and your partner have caught the call.” He pulled a small notebook out of his breast pocket, thumbed through it, and said, “Yongsan South Post, Unit 43-B, Artillery Drive. Assigned to the J-2, Colonel Oswald Q. Tidwell.”

This is where two guys with less savoir faire would’ve whistled in awe. J-2 meant military intelligence. The J stood for “joint command”: the United Nations, U.S. Forces Korea, and the 8th United States Army. So Colonel Oswald Q. Tidwell was in charge of military intelligence on the Korean Peninsula and answered only to the commander, 8th United States Army. In army parlance this is the equivalent of sitting at the right hand of god.

“Anybody hurt?” I asked.

Pollard studied his notes. “Not that’s been reported so far. But Mrs. Tidwell is hysterical.”

“Why?”

“Her daughter is missing. Hasn’t reported in since fifteen hundred hours Tuesday.”

“You mean Jessica?” Ernie asked.

Pollard checked his notes again. “Right. That’s her name.”

“Shit,” Ernie said.

He jammed the jeep in gear and swerved past Pollard and around the other jeep. The two MPs looked after us, shaking their heads, glad that they weren’t going to have to delve into the messy family life of Colonel Oswald Q. Tidwell.

Jessica Tidwell was notorious in the 8th Army. Only seventeen, she’d already become a legend. Last year, when she was a junior at Seoul American High School, the Department of Defense school on post for military dependents, she’d become involved with some fast-talking G.I. who worked at the 9th Support Group, the personnel unit on post. She attended a party at the barracks and, apparently, she’d first turned her amorous attentions on the guy who invited her and then on at least a half-dozen other young soldiers. Word leaked out. Ernie and I hadn’t investigated the incident and I was grateful for that. Nobody thanks you when you air the dirty laundry of the family of a field-grade officer. But after the official report wound its way up the chain of command, the half-dozen or so G.I. s involved were brought up on charges-statutory rape and disrespect to the dependent of a field grade officer. Within days, they were not only convicted but two of them did some time in the stockade and all of them were summarily dismissed from the army.

But punishing the guilty wasn’t enough for the honchos of 8th Army, not when one of their own was involved. They went one step further. The entire 9th Support Group-personnel, offices, barracks, equipment, vehicles, everything-was transferred to a small logistics compound about twenty miles outside of Seoul. In other words, banished for their sins.

Since then, Mrs. Tidwell had been keeping a very tight reign on her willful teenage daughter. Ernie knew of her from reports and gossip but even he was smart enough to stay strictly away from Jessica Tidwell. Or at least I hoped he was.

The Tidwells lived in a sprawling split-level home on Yongsan Compound South Post. A squad of MPs had already secured the perimeter and I recognized a sedan parked in the driveway as belonging to Colonel Cosgrove, the Chief Chaplain of the 8th Army. Inside, the chaplain sat on a leather upholstered couch, comforting Mrs. Tidwell. She held an embroidered handkerchief to her mouth and rose to her feet when we walked in.

“Are you the investigators?” she asked.

I nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”

“What took you so long?”

I didn’t know how to answer that one so I didn’t.

She held her body stiffly and wore a cotton dress that was shaped by petticoats and elastic undergarments.

“I don’t care about the money,” she said, waving her arm. “They can have all that. I just want you to find Jessica.” Her face wrinkled into a mask of rage. “And I want you to find her now!”

Neither Ernie nor I moved. The chaplain, a tall man with thick gray hair, moved toward her and grabbed her elbow. “Now Margaret,” he said, “these young men are professionals. Let them do their jobs. And don’t worry, they’ll find Jessica.”

We proceeded into the den, the room that Mrs. Tidwell told us was used by her husband as his home office. She explained what was missing. As we examined the evidence, she said, “I know you’re afraid to ask but you must want to know why Oswald isn’t here.”

Both Ernie and I gazed steadily as Mrs. Tidwell, not speaking. The chaplain grimaced.

“My husband is a very busy man,” Mrs. Tidwell said. “His responsibilities are massive. If he could, he’d be here right now, looking for his daughter.

“Don’t smirk like that,” she said to us. “I won’t have it! Not in my own home. There is such a thing as silent contempt, you know,” she screamed.

The chaplain stepped toward her. She lashed out at him with a fist. He dodged it easily, waited a moment, and then touched her shoulder. She turned and crumpled into his arms, where she stayed for a few minutes, sobbing.

None of the windows leading into Colonel Tidwell’s home office had been broken or jimmied in any way. He normally kept the door leading into the den padlocked from the outside. Mrs. Tidwell told us that when she checked the room shortly after her husband left for work that morning, she’d found it open. At the time she hadn’t thought much of it. But later, while airing out the house, she noticed that the door to the safe was open also. She called her husband and he told her to make sure that the thousand dollars in U.S. greenbacks he kept there for emergency use was still intact. It wasn’t. The envelope was gone. Colonel Tidwell called the MPs from his office.

Technically, no American personnel in Korea are supposed to be in possession of U.S. currency. When a G.I. or his dependents arrives in country, all cash is converted into blue or red Military Payment Certificates. The idea is that it will make it more difficult for the North Korean Communists to get their hands on U.S. currency which they could then use as international exchange. Despite this restriction, greenbacks are still available, illegally, on the black-market and fetch a higher price in won, the Korean currency, than MPC.

A full colonel who is the 8th Army J-2 was not going to be criticized for keeping a small pile of American cash on hand; an enlisted G.I. would be locked up for it.

Clearly, the theft of the money had been an inside job. There was no sign of a break-in and whoever had entered the den had used a key. The safe had been opened by someone using the combination.

The household help consisted of a Korean maid and a Korean “serviceman,” what G.I. s would call a houseboy. I spoke to both of them. They were nervous they might lose their jobs. Neither admitted seeing anyone entering the den but they’d left the previous evening and hadn’t returned until dawn. There were also two contract Korean security guards outside, supposedly to protect the J-2 and his family from possible attack by North Korean commandos. I didn’t bother to speak to them because neither had entered the house. But I took note of which guards had been on shift the previous night in case I needed to speak to them later.