W.e.b. Griffin - The Corps II - CALL TO ARMS

"Do you suppose you could bring him here, Sergeant?" Commander Grotski asked.

"Commander," the sergeant of the guard said, "you don't really want to see to this character, do you?"

"Oh, but I do. Go get him, Sergeant."

The sergeant of the guard again looked in vain for Captain Kamnik's help.

When he had gone, Commander Grotski asked, "Are you a betting man, Casimir?"

"Sometimes," Kamnik said.

"How about three will get you five that this McCoy will fall down the stairs on his way here?"

"It happens, Commander," Kamnik said. "I do my best to stop it, but sometimes it happens."

Five minutes later General Prisoner Thomas Michael McCoy was led into the brig commander's office. He was dressed in dungarees. A ten-inch-high letter "P" had been stenciled to the thighs of his trousers and onto the rear of his jacket. He was in handcuffs, and the handcuffs were chained to a thick leather belt around his waist. His ankles were encircled with heavy iron rings, and the rings were chained together, restricting his movement to a shuffle.

His hands were swollen, and red with iodine. There was more iodine on his face, on his mouth, and above his eyes. His face was swollen, and in a few hours both of his eyes would be dark.

They must have been really pissed at him, which was not surprising, since he broke a guard's nose, Commander Grotski thought. Otherwise the marks of his beating would not be so visible.

"What happened to your face?" Commander Grotski asked.

General Prisoner McCoy thought about his reply for a moment before he gave it.

"I fell down in the shower," he said.

"I fell down in the shower, sir," Grotski corrected him.

"I fell down in the shower, sir," McCoy dutifully parroted.

"That will be all, Sergeant," Commander Grotski said. "When we need you, we'll call for you."

The sergeant is worried that the moment he's out of the room, Grotski thought, McCoy will tell us that three, four, maybe five guards got him in the box and had at him with billy clubs, or saps, or whatever they thought would cause the most pain. That's against the Regulations for the Governance of the Naval Service.

"You really fell down in the shower, McCoy?" Grotski asked, when the sergeant of the guard had gone, closing the door after him.

"Yes, sir," McCoy said, after thinking it over.

"Tough guy, are you?" Grotski asked.

McCoy didn't answer.

"I asked you a question, McCoy," Grotski said.

"I guess I'm as tough as most," McCoy said, and remembered finally to add, "sir."

"You don't know what tough is, you dumb Mick sonofabitch," Grotski said. "And you're the dumbest sonofabitch I've seen in a long time. You don't even know what you're facing, do you? It hasn't penetrated that thick Mick head of yours, has it? You're really so dumb you think you can take on Portsmouth, don't you?"

McCoy didn't reply.

"That sergeant isn't even very good at what he did," Grotski said. "He's nowhere near good enough to get himself assigned to Portsmouth. At Portsmouth, he would be a rookie. When they beat you at Portsmouth, they got it down to a fine art. No marks. It just hurts. And how long are you going to be in Portsmouth, McCoy?"

"They gave me five-to-ten, sir," McCoy said.

"Let me tell you how it works. The first time you look cockeyed at somebody at Portsmouth, you dumb Mick, they'll give you a working over that'll make the one you just had feel like your mother kissed you. And then they'll add six months on your sentence for 'silent insolence.' And every time you look cockeyed at a guard there, you'll get another working over, and another six months, until one of two things happens. You won't look cockeyed at anyone, or you will fall down the stairs and break your neck. Then they'll bury you in the prison cemetery. You don't really understand that, do you?"

"I'm going to keep my nose clean, sir," McCoy said.

"Bullshit! You're not smart enough to keep your nose clean," Grotski said, nastily.

He let that sink in.

"You wouldn't even know what to do, would you, you stupid sonofabitch, if I told you I can get you out of Portsmouth?"

McCoy looked at him uncomprehendingly.

Finally, he said, "Sir?"

"If I was in your shoes, you miserable asshole, and somebody told me he could get me out of Portsmouth, I would get on my knees and ask him what I had to do, and pray to the Blessed Virgin that he would believe me when I said I would do it."

McCoy looked at him, his eyes widening.

And then he dropped to his knees. He tried to raise his hands together before him in an attitude of prayer, but his handcuffed wrists were chained to the leather belt around his waist, and he could move them only slightly above his waist.

"You tell me what I have to do, sir, and I'll do it. I swear on my mother's grave!"

"And now you pray, you miserable bastard," Grotski ordered. "And out loud!"

McCoy looked at him, frightened and confused.

"What do I pray?"

"Say your Hail Marys, you pimple on the ass of the Marine Corps," Grotski ordered icily.

"Hail Mary, full of grace," McCoy began, "the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen."

Grotski looked at Captain Kamnik, then nodded his head in an order for him to leave the room.

He closed the door to the office after them.

"He's pretty good at that, Casimir," he said. "Do you think maybe he was an altar boy, too?"

"Jesus!" Kamnik said, and then spotted the sergeant of the guard. "Wait outside please, Sergeant," he ordered.

When he looked at Grotski, Grotski was grinning broadly.

"Now what?"

"It's what is known as psychological warfare," he said. "I'll let him keep it up a while until I'm sure he is in the right state of mind, and then I'll offer him a chance to redeem himself."

"How?" Kamnik ordered.

"You ever hear of a Lieutenant Colonel Carlson?" he asked.

Kamnik shook his head. "No."

"Well, he's apparently on the general's shitlist, too. Some kind of a nut. He's being given some kind of commando outfit. The general said when I got McCoy out of here, he thought it would be nice if McCoy volunteered for it. I had the feeling he wouldn't be all that unhappy if McCoy got himself blown away as one of Carlson's commandos."

"And you think he'll volunteer?"

"I'm not going to let him off his knees until he does," Commander Grotski said.

(One)

The San Diego Yacht Club

1400 Hours, 28 February 1942

The Yellow Cab dropped Second Lieutenant Kenneth J. McCoy, USMCR, wearing dungarees, at the end of Pier Four at the yacht club. The driver was not accustomed to carrying dungaree-clad Marines-for that matter Marines period-to the yacht club. And he watched curiously as McCoy walked down the pier and finally crossed the gangplank onto the Last Time. Then he shrugged his shoulders and drove off.

McCoy slid open the varnished teak door to the lounge and stepped inside.

Ernie Sage and Dorothy Burnes were there, listening to the radio. Dorothy was sitting uncomfortably in one of the armchairs, draped in a tentlike cotton dress. Ernie Sage, wearing very brief shorts and a T-shirt, jumped up from one of the couches when she saw him.

"What are you doing home so early?" she asked as she crossed the room to him. She grabbed his ears, pulled his face to hers, and kissed him wetly and noisily on the mouth. "Not that I'm not glad to see you, as you can see."

Dorothy laughed.

"They gave me the afternoon off," McCoy said.

"You should have called me, I would have come for you," Ernie said. She put her arm around him and pressed against him, confirming his suspicion that there was nothing but Ernie under the T-shirt.