Stuart Slade: A Mighty Endeavor

“You have heard we are to go home?” Major Belloc didn’t sound too pleased at the prospect.

“I have, sir.” Lieutenant Jordain Roul wasn’t that happy with the idea either. The options were to resign from the Army and go back to a France that was very close to being German-occupied, or stay in the Army and go back to a French Indochina that was very close to being Japanese-occupied. Neither really appealed that much. “A lot of the men are saying they would rather stay here.”

“And that surprises you?” Belloc sounded almost broken. “We are the Legion; the Fifth Régiment Etranger d’Infanterie . We have no home other than the Legion and the men have no place in France until their enlistment is concluded. Worse, we have not just been defeated; we have surrendered. I doubt we have a place in the Legion after this. With no place to go, staying here has its merits.”

Roul looked around. The truth was that staying on did look attractive. The prisoner of war camp was clean and well-built. The food wasn’t to French taste, but it was fresh and there was plenty of it. There were doctors from the Swiss Red Cross to look after the wounded and they had received everything they asked for. If this is a sample of what waits for us here, then I can see how the men might find it welcoming. “I hear the Thais are asking the Germans in the unit if they want to serve as advisors to the new units they are forming.”

Belloc laughed. “I heard the same. And that some men were accepting. Although, it seems that those are well-disposed to the present government in Germany will not be welcome here.”

“There is General de Gaulle of course. And his Free French movement.”

“Yes, there is always General de Gaulle.”

Mongkut Chandrapa na Ayutthya, to his great relief no longer a Sergeant, stopped at the door of the school. The teacher had a big map of the new Thailand pinned to the wall. The areas occupied in the war were marked “The Recovered Provinces.” She was teaching the children the names of those provinces and explaining how they had been returned to their rightful owners. She was young herself and very earnest; one of many who had volunteered to leave the cities and come to these country villages to teach the children.

“And so, Our Heroes defeated the French who had taken our land from us and freed all our people. The Japanese didn’t like this and they sent a great army to force us back, but Our Heroes met that army and defeated it as well. And so, peace was agreed and Our Heroes are coming home.” She looked up and saw Mongkut standing at the door, his army rifle slung over his shoulder. The 11th was receiving a new rifle, the Kar-98k, that was shorter, lighter and more powerful than the old Type 52 he had carried. So the demobilized soldiers had been told they could take their old-model rifles home with them if they wished.

“Look children, a great honor has been granted to us. One of Our Heroes has come to visit our school.”

“Daddy!” Mongkut heard his daughter squeal with delight. The teacher had arrived after he had left for the Army, so she hadn’t known he was Sirisoon’s father. She did now. Mongkut didn’t care. He was looking at his daughter who had grown so much since he had left. And she was looking at him with her eyes shining.

“Honored Sir, please, could you tell the children about what the war was like?”

For a moment Mongkut smelled the stench of the flamethrowers and roasting flesh. Above all, he remembered the searing hate that had filled him when the beaten Japanese refused to surrender and how he had started to relish their screams as they were burned in their foxholes. The teacher is young and a girl, she has no idea what she is asking. If she did, she would want me to cut out my tongue before telling them the truth.

Mongkut entered the schoolroom, making a respectful wai to the portrait of the King on the wall. He sat on the table at the front of the class and told the children about what he had seen of the provinces, how poor the people were and how they needed so much help to recover from the years of occupation. Some of the boys were disappointed. They had wanted to hear about the fighting, but he simply couldn’t bring himself to describe it. He showed them where he had been but of the battles themselves he said nothing. In the end, he just said, “the French and Japanese were skilled and fought very hard. But we fought better and we won in the end. Never forget; it is never wrong for us to defend ourselves."And the children had smiled. Only the teacher heard what he added so softly afterwards.

“Even when it has torn out my soul.”

“We know you did it.” The man spoke to David Newton very quietly indeed.

“Don’t know what you are talking about.” The reply was equally quiet.

“Good. But, be aware that there are other people who think like you. And who are ready to do the same when the time comes.”

“Drink a good beer, you mean?”

“That’s right.” Calvert looked at the student with appreciation. He really was an excellent recruit and would go far. Until he got careless and was killed. That was inevitable, of course; it was what happened to all resistance fighters. Eight months from becoming active to becoming dead was the average. “Just don’t drink any more beer until we show you the good brands. And how to appreciate them.”

“What if I run up a thirst before then? I still owe… the bar… some debts.”

“You’ll have to be patient.” Calvert looked at the student in front of him with much more sympathy than his expression revealed. “You think you came up short, don’t you?”

“I… did nothing. Nothing. And she… ”

“You froze up. Most people do… when having their first beer. I did. It was in Norway. The beer started to flow and I froze up. But, I was in a party and the others kept it running until I was back in the game. You were drinking on your own and everything went to Hell so fast you had no time to recover. Now, you do. Now you can learn to enjoy your beer properly.

“How many people… like their beer?”

“That’s something you’ll never know. You’ll know only me. And I won’t know the people who drink with you. You won’t know their drinking friends either. Think about it.”

Newton nodded. “I’ll have another beer. You’re buying?”

“Of course. If you’re drinking.”

The Navy and Army delegations trooped into the conference room. The Spirit Warriors, Shingen Takeda thought contemptuously. They call themselves Samurai and claim to follow Bushido, yet they are nothing but bullying braggarts and brutes who do not understand the meaning of the words honor and bravery. Once, I would have taken the head of any such man who claimed to be a Samurai.

There was a reason why his uniform was plain and unmarked by decorations or insignia of rank. Officially, it was because that the only thing that anybody needed to know about him was that he was a member of the Tokubetsu K Kempeitai . The Special Higher Military Police Corps.

Privately, it was because the thought of wearing a decoration awarded by the Spirit Warriors sickened him. Nevertheless, the unmarked uniform was, in its own way, a decoration. There were 36,000 members of the Kempeitai ; only 107 belonged to the Tokubetsi Koto section. Mostly their identities were unknown other than to the rest of the section. How special they were was something they kept amongst themselves.